Solar cycle 24 continues the slump

It seems possible that we’ve seen the double peak, and it will be downhill after this.

A similar status quo in radio flux – little change from last month.

The Ap magnetic index dropped 4 units from last month, suggesting a slowing in the solar dynamo.

On August 1st, solar scientist David Hathaway updated his prediction page but the text is identical to last month – no change in the forecast.

The current prediction for Sunspot Cycle 24 gives a smoothed sunspot number maximum of about 67 in the Summer of 2013. The smoothed sunspot number has already reached 67 (in February 2012) due to the strong peak in late 2011 so the official maximum will be at least this high. The smoothed sunspot number has been rising again over the last four months. We are currently over four years into Cycle 24. The current predicted and observed size makes this the smallest sunspot cycle since Cycle 14 which had a maximum of 64.2 in February of 1906.

About the only significant even in the last month is that the solar polar fields have begun their reversal, indicating we are at “solar max”, which seems like a misnomer given the low activity observed at the moment. That’s why I think we may have seen the “double peak” and it is downhill from here.

450 thoughts on “Solar cycle 24 continues the slump”

I disagree that we’ve seen the double peak, and it will be downhill after this. There’ll be more peaks and the downhill will start after ~2014/15, but the strong monthly peak in late 2011 may remain the maximum monthly ssn for this long cycle.

But according to sources, the solar changes will have little to no effect on the earths climate?
I mean TSI only varies by a mere smidgen (+/- 0.1%), right?
and of course, the rising CO2 levels will keep us nice and warm anyway?

On a more sobering note:
I was wondering if a definitively weak solar cycle does actually lead to significant (i.e. measurable)surface temperature changes, exactly how the MSM and super solar scientists will explain it away?
On the one hand, it would be a good ‘experiment’ with the chance to see how such solar changes affect temperatures, especially the timelag between cause and effect – and perhaps thus confirm/refute the ‘constant’ solar claims (pun intended). On the other hand, a long time lag will simply play into the alarmists and politicos hands and all the while those in fuel poverty will be freezing their proverbial butts off.

Sunspot counting with the plethora of micro-specs in this cycle makes the subject a bit wooly, and finding a second peak is like finding a castle in the clouds. However, F10.7 is a measurement that sidesteps the sunspot size issue, and I see no “double peak” there. In fact, I am unclear why there is an effort to look for a second peak. Also, TSI does not look like it is throwing in the towel for this cycle. UVE peak looks like it’s long gone, though, for those that look for that.

Most of readers here are expecting for the low solar activity to cause (or coincide) with global cooling. My expectations are that low solar activity would coincide (but caused is a very different proposition) with reduction in the Arctic and sub Arctic tectonic activity.http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/SSN-NAP.htm
As a consequence of the les active sun or the far North Atlantic/Arctic regions, the N. Hemisphere’s climate may cool. Either way scientist (and not only climate ones) will have a new fertile field of research.

It is often said that TSI can’t effect changes in climate because it only varies by 0.1%. But I don’t get this as the global average temp is 287 and one thousandth of that is 0.28. 0.28 is a large cut of the temperature anomaly isn’t it?

Suppose also that the very small peak-to-trough difference in incoming solar radiance (it’s about 0.15% of total activity) were amplified sevenfold by cosmic-ray displacement, as Svensmark and many others think.

In that event, there could be half a Celsius degree of global cooling by 2020, and possibly more beyond that date, even after allowing for the small warming influence of CO2. The scare will not survive even seven more years without warming. Perhaps the end is in sight.

Kev-in-Uk says:
August 13, 2013 at 12:22 am
But according to sources, the solar changes will have little to no effect on the earths climate?
I mean TSI only varies by a mere smidgen (+/- 0.1%), right?
and of course, the rising CO2 levels will keep us nice and warm anyway?

=========================================================
Its an attractive thought that the extra CO2 will keep us warm despite the sun going into doldrums. Is there any scientific evidence showing whether the additional CO2 will or won’t keep us warm? Or do we keep arguing the same old talking points depending on what side of the AGW fence we happen to be on until the evidence is in.

@Kev-in-UK I think any drop in temps from a low-activity sun is not going to show up as a distinct signal – there are so many other factors in play with regards to surface temps.

Let’s suppose there is an actual effect of -1C over 10 years. How would you spot a 0.1C / yr effect amidst the noise of natural variability and be able to assign certainty to the cause being a quiet sun?

Suppose that the solar influence on global mean surface temperature, setting aside natural internal variability, varies as the time-integral of solar activity over the previous 11-year cycle.
…
The scare will not survive even seven more years without warming. Perhaps the end is in sight.

There could be good physical mechanisms for such a correspondence. Ridiculous! You really do like to colour outside the lines, don’t you?

Vukcevic, I agree reduction in solar activity in of itself will not cause cooling and it certainly will not happen over night. First, the cooling most likely will happen and quite probably we will be able to distinctly see it the empirical data. This is probably due to a phase shift in PDO, now I do not want to rile up the Ocean people, I now know PDO is NOT a climate mechanic, it is simply a tool in the tool box for possibly predicting future climate shifts, We have seen clearly from multiple authors on WUWT that temperature has plateaued over the past 17 years and quite possibly has begun to decrease since 05 (HADCRUT4 is showing a slight decline, albeit a VERY short period of time).

The diminished solar activity will only heighten the cooling, that ‘should’ come from the shift in PDO.

Now the lag, I am attacking this from logic not any scientific literature. It is intuitive that after a natural warm up as we have experienced, that if you turn off the heat it will take some time to cool. Take this analogy:
You are at Grandma’s for Christmas, shes turned the heat up like normal, everyone’s running around having a great time, it gets warm in the house. You secretly turn off the heat (solar output diminishes) this you can hide from the family but outwardly you ask if you can open the door to let the heat out. Does the room immediately? No, it takes time, our atmosphere has a tremendous amount of inertia built up, so once there is a shift in climate it will take sometime for us to physically see it and then of course to measure it even longer to see a trend.

Here it comes though, When it is all said and done, by 2030 I (unscientifically) predict a reduction in global temperatures to around .25 – .3C. I say unscientifically, but the last time PDO was in this phase, 1945 – 1975 (roughly), temps decreased approximately .23C (HADCRUT3 before some of that cooling disappeared in V4, now only .12C) while solar output was the highest in the past 1000 years.

Who knows, V5 of these data sets will find a way to, adjust/ hide the cooling.

Sunspot counting with the plethora of micro-specs in this cycle makes the subject a bit wooly, and finding a second peak is like finding a castle in the clouds. However, F10.7 is a measurement that sidesteps the sunspot size issue, and I see no “double peak” there. In fact, I am unclear why there is an effort to look for a second peak. Also, TSI does not look like it is throwing in the towel for this cycle. UVE peak looks like it’s long gone, though, for those that look for that.

It will be an interesting winter.

= = = = = = =

Well it may be that the Sun variance is amplified more than expected. Read: Nir Shaviv’s paper:

“Using the Oceans as a Calorimeter to Quantify the Solar Radiative Forcing” Abstract.
Over the 11-year solar cycle, small changes in the total solar irradiance (TSI) give rise to small variations in the global energy budget. It was suggested, however, that different mechanisms could amplify solar activity variations to give large climatic effects, a possibility which is still a subject of debate. With this in mind, we use the oceans as a calorimeter to measure the radiative forcing variations associated with the solar cycle. This is achieved through the study of three independent records, the net heat flux into the oceans over 5 decades, the sea level change rate based on tide gauge records over the 20th century, and the sea surface temperature variations. Each of the records can be used to consistently derive the same oceanic heat flux. We find that the total radiative forcing associated with solar cycles variations is about 5 to 7 times larger than just those associated with the TSI variations, thus implying the necessary existence of an amplification mechanism, though without pointing to which one.
(my bolding)http://www.sciencebits.com/files/articles/CalorimeterFinal.pdf

There would appear to be some significant unknown unknowns in the effect of solar changes on the Earth’s climate.

It is SO exhausting to observe otherwise knowledgeable folks still feeling the need to publicly hang on by bleeding fingernails to the totally unproven meme of “small warming influence of CO2”. Come on! You know it’s a crock. Out of context lab physics inappropriately applied to a hugely complex system.

Suppose also that the very small peak-to-trough difference in incoming solar radiance (it’s about 0.15% of total activity) were amplified sevenfold by cosmic-ray displacement, as Svensmark and many others think.

In that event, there could be half a Celsius degree of global cooling by 2020, and possibly more beyond that date, even after allowing for the small warming influence of CO2. The scare will not survive even seven more years without warming. Perhaps the end is in sight.

= = = =

The scare will have gone away but seven years of ‘Progressive’ implementation of Agenda21 will be very difficult to unwind. This is probably the reason for the shrillness of the AGW proponents in their rush to implement irreversible changes in energy infrastructure, taxation and governance before it becomes clear that there is no further global warming anthropogenic or otherwise. The scare will have done its job and be discarded – unlike the crippling changes to economies.

As already apparent in UK and Germany the provision of energy is already too high for some domestic customers and 5000 extra deaths were recorded in UK just in March 2013 due to cold and energy poverty – with no political response. IFF the global temperatures do drop the cold winters will be concurrent with extreme increases in energy costs (which will have ‘necessarily sky rocketed’ TM Obama) . Expect progressive politicians at that point to attempt to apportion blame for these deaths probably to the ‘climate science Team’. Nevertheless, their policies and governance can be expected to remain regardless of increasing deaths from cold as they were the long term aim of the AGW scare.

We are currently in a 130 months long run where monthly average SSN didn’t reach the value of 100 (last time was September 2002). That’s the 4th longest run since SSN records begun in 1749. It has only been beaten by Dalton minimum, and two periods at the end of XIX century (periods between Mar 1873 and Sep 1892, i.e. 233 months, and between August 1894 and October 1905, i.e. 135 months).

Six months more, and we will be in the 3rd period with lowest activity. And if this Solar Cycle’s max ends without any individual month’s average SSN having reached 100, which seems pretty likely, and activity falls again, it would not be dificult that the SSN takes at least 8 more years from now to break the current run, so we may end up with a period of reduced activity lasting more than 233 months, which would be second only to the one during Dalton minimum, since records begun.

The Maunder Minimum was a period of very low Sunspot activity, & we had the LIA which ha been shown to have been a global occurrence. A variability of an object – the primary source of all life – of one tenth of one percent, that contains 99.9% of the mass of the Solar System, would suggest to me it would be folly to discount it’s potential effects upon the Earth & its climate! It possess around 332,900 times the mass of the Earth, come on chaps & chapesses! On top of which the paleo-geological record dating back 500 million years, suggests that whilst possessing some 7000pm of CO2 in the atmosphere, we still suffered from Ice-ages! Go figure, something (multiple?) other than CO2 must be having an affect. Just a thought! Anyway, must get back to my X-Box 360 Lara Croft is about to take on the baddies………..whoops I mean I have to re-run my GCM model to determine how warm we will be when we all die at some predetermined point in the future! :-(

Well, the world will soon see if the Svensmark Effect is a plausible theory or not.

CAGW charlatans (as well as many scientists/thinkers I respect) are very skeptical the Svensmark Effect exists, so the next 18 years or so will provide a galactic sized experiment to see if increased galactic cosmic rays hitting the earth from decreased solar activity will induce increased cloud cover, creating a higher albedo and falling global temperatures.

I’ve always thought the Svensmark Effect was a very plausible hypothesis given the LIA corresponded very closely with the Wolf, Sporer, Maunder and Dalton Grand Solar Minima, but we’ll soon see first hand whether this was merely correlation or real causation.

I sure hope Svensmark is wrong for the world’s sake, because during the the Wolf Solar Minimum (1280-1350), about 25% of Europe died of starvation due to severe famines from shortened growing seasons and bone-numbingly cold winters…. This when then followed by the Black Death (1348-1350) which wiped out about 50% of the poor souls that survived the famines…

How many times are they going to fail in their predictions before they start a rethink? The attitude does seem to be fingers in ears eyes tightly shut shouting bla, bla, bla, bla, bla….it’s not the Sun, it’s not the Sun! Reminds me of Lenin,” if you tell a lie often enough, it becomes the truth!”

@ Samurai
I sure hope Svensmark is wrong for the world’s sake, because during the the Wolf Solar Minimum (1280-1350), about 25% of Europe died of starvation due to severe famines from shortened growing seasons and bone-numbingly cold winters…. This when then followed by the Black Death (1348-1350) which wiped out about 50% of the poor souls that survived the famines…

That would be joy to the ears of the anti-humanists within the Greenalist camp! Mass death of human beings reducing the Earth’s human population by 6,500,000,000, wow, what a concept, ghastly thought! Would there b enough human beings left to dispose of the bodies? I recall the noble tale of one village during the Great Plague, in the north of England I think it was, where they refused access to the village, & denied anyone leaving by force if necessary, to prevent them from spreading the plague to neighbouring villages. The entire village was wiped out by the disease, they chose to sacrifice themselves in an effort to eradicate it. Aren’t human beings funny things? They sacrifice themselves for others. Would that be something that the Greenalists would do? I think not somehow……………

I often look at data for unusual features, then suggest possible scenario (call it playing devils advocate) and often infuriate those in the know by this kind of pseudoscience.
If one assumes that the Ap index is yet another measure of the solar input (the others being measured by the SSN, TSI and F10.7) make an attempt to correlate global (land as longer and more reliable) temperature records to the Ap, the result is shown here:http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/ApGLT.htm
It can be concluded that solar output on this measure is responsible to about 0.4C pp
This could be also result of variability in the TSI and or the ‘Svensmark factor’ (see post by Viscount Monckton of Brenchley, further up the thread)
So assumed solar variability is currently lifted by some other factor/s (of which CO2 could be one even if only minor contributor) to amount of about ~0.65C.
Assuming that the Ap index, due to low solar activity, falls to its base level, than a temperature fall of 0.4 C from the current levels could be expected.
This is more or less in line with the Viscount Monckton’s assessment :In that event, there could be half a Celsius degree of global cooling by 2020.

According to Jack Eddy in his book “The sun, earth and near earth space” of the energy emitted by the sun that reaches Earth’s environs only 60% makes it to ground level. The rest is absorbed in the atmosphere or reflected back into space. It takes around 100,000 years for heat generated by the nuclear furnace at the center of the sun to reach its visible surface. Also at its visible surface the plasma is as dense as is space about 500 km above Earth where we typically put satellites. He says that the sun’s plasma half way from its visible surface to its center (about 350,000 km) is still less than half as dense than Earth’s atmosphere at ground level. (At the top of Everest it is about 70% of the density at sea level.)
I think we misjudge the sun and what it is capable of because we don’t understand it and we have little idea of the effect of the time-lags associated with much of its apparent activity. In just the area of the sun’s jet streams I suspect helio-physicists might have decades of work ahead of them before they can really understand how they work and what causes their changes.
In my view TSI is only part of the equation. The sun delivers energy to Earth via a number of different mechanisms some of which involve its magnetic field lines interacting with Earth’s field lines. Also the role of flux portals might be important.
Finally we mustn’t forget the huge role our oceans, lakes and ice shelves play in temperature moderation. This affects the lags in the change in climate in different parts of the globe when inputs change.

In 2003 (published January 2004) I devised a formula, extrapolating to the unusually low solar activity in the late 2020shttp://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/LFC2.htm
which is now widely accepted as a likely scenario, but then ridiculed by the most eminent solar scientists (from NASA to Stanford) with lone exception of a British academic also a winner of the Hale Prize, awarded by the Solar Physics Division of the American Astronomical Society.

And now the grand convergence of long cycles begins; solar, AMO, PDO, and side indicator of south Atlantic sea surface temps. The already over heated engine of warming hype will not be able to keep up with counter measures of what comes next. Like a massive flood breaching a dike system, it will be hopeless to keep plugging the holes with fingers at all the breaks and leaks.

The arctic region this year was a couple weeks late getting above freezing and was a couple weeks earlier passing back under freezing. Could this be the first indication that the growing seasons will be significantly changed?

Kev-in-UK writes,” But according to sources, the solar changes will have little to no effect on the earth’s climate? I mean TSI only varies by a mere smidgen (+/- 0.1%), right?” Now, I know that in recent times the coronation of King CO2 has made it unnecessary to look at other correlations. Here’s one I’ve followed since 1955 when I got my ham ticket at age 15. That small solar cycle change of +/- 0.1% TSI results in dramatic changes in ionization at the F2 layer which reflects high frequency radio waves (so-called short wave radio) back to Earth- the only wireless communication beyond line-of-sight that existed for most of the 20th century. At the top of “strong” solar cycles, the maximum usable frequency (MUF) is around 50 MHz. At the bottom, the MUF is around 10 MHz. This is a stunning difference of a physical mechanism, F layer ionization and MUF, resulting or correlating with that puny difference in TSI. I’m not sure what the implication is beyond something I see little of by many climate scientists and their combative cheerleaders- modesty in claims of understanding and prediction.

Alan the Brit says:
August 13, 2013 at 3:17 am
I recall the noble tale of one village during the Great Plague, in the north of England I think it was, where they refused access to the village, & denied anyone leaving by force if necessary, to prevent them from spreading the plague to neighbouring villages.

Unfortunately your recollection is not correct. The village was Eyam, no force was used.

The entire village was wiped out by the disease,

It was not, about a third of the residents died and there are descendants of the survivors still living in the village today.

The talk of cosmic ray effects on the atmosphere due to a weaker sun reminds me of a physics experiment I did with a primitive cloud chamber in high school. The mild radioactive source I used produced clouds far out of proportion to the tiny particles themselves. Makes one believe that minor changes in solar irradiation actually could affect weather here.

Is there any scientific evidence showing whether the additional CO2 will or won’t keep us warm?How much will today’s temp increase fall tonight.
Over 100 million station records say that on average the fall in temp tonight will match how much it warms up today, so no Co2 isn’t going to keep us warm.

At the top of “strong” solar cycles, the maximum usable frequency (MUF) is around 50 MHz. At the bottom, the MUF is around 10 MHz.

I was eating dinner Sunday with my brother-in and his brother, both ham operators. I mentioned the weakening Sun, and got the impression from Bill that the Sun was interfering more than normal with his ham radio signal, which kind of surprised me. I didn’t realize there was a inverse relationship with MUF.

Monckton of Brenchley says:
“The scare will not survive even seven more years without warming. Perhaps the end is in sight….”

In a sane world the lack of warming for almost two decades should have had a massive effect on global opinions, even of idiot politicians like Cameron. But even now we have the most powerful man in the world (and possibly the most deluded) stating not only that there is still warming but that it is accelerating!

I’ve started to think that no warming will have little effect on global opinions for years to come. The one thing that could change everything would be the onset of sustained global cooling.

This puts sceptics in a very difficult position. The one thing that could bring sanity to the world (and victory for the sceptics) is sustained global cooling. And yet we sceptics know all too well that significant global cooling really would be bad for the welfare of humanity.

MiCro says: August 13, 2013 at 6:19 am “I was eating dinner Sunday with my brother-in and his brother, both ham operators. I mentioned the weakening Sun, and got the impression from Bill that the Sun was interfering more than normal with his ham radio signal, …”

Apart from the UK 1976 and 1983 “heat wave” summers, winters from the early 1970’s, including 1976 and 1983, were very very cold. And rom my own experience in Portsmouth, UK, ~1983, cold with a wind chill of about -20c.

We have some hope in the CLOUD experiments of Jasper Kirkby at CERN …….. It is my thinking that sooner than later his work will come to have a profound effect on the future…… This is real science at work ……. worth watching his original lecture from a few years ago, it had a profound effect on my thinking …….. Looking forward to walking on the frozen river THAMES at Walton again as I did as a three year old in 1963 !!!

I suppose that a figure of .1 % less solar radiation that a quiet sun gives seems quite the stretch to suggest that this makes any difference upon the world’s climate. However, I hear tell that there exist some extremist climate scientists who actually think that a rise of .00012% of CO2 raised the global temperature of the earth by .74 C in the last hundred years. I wonder which one is the real stretch?

Reality check. Solar-anything driving weather pattern variation is easily refuted. A strong El Nino (which actually spits out heat from the oceans, thus cooling them) can warm things up on land in the face of a weak solar cycle. Therefore Oceanic conditions are more powerful than solar affects. Same relationship goes for anthropogenic CO2. It is easily overcome by oceanic and atmospheric short and long term oscillations. A La Nina (which actually ends up warming the oceans) leaves us cold even when the Sun is cooking and CO2 is rising. Therefore Oceanic conditions are more powerful than solar and anthropogenic CO2. There are many other oceanic and atmospheric metrics that demonstrate no correlation to solar conditions. So why are we discussing frigid or boiling Earth in this thread instead of what the Sun is doing on its own merits?

@Monkton
The half a degree Celsius cooling by 2020 is not the outer bond or even the full extent of the best guess case if multidecadal ocean temp cycles are not also factored in on top of this solar-cosmic combo. Let’s consider all of the notable cycles in play here and not just solar/cosmic combinations, stored heat cycles in addition to incoming energy.

Here it comes though, When it is all said and done, by 2030 I (unscientifically) predict a reduction in global temperatures to around .25 – .3C. I say unscientifically, but the last time PDO was in this phase, 1945 – 1975 (roughly), temps decreased approximately .23C (HADCRUT3 before some of that cooling disappeared in V4, now only .12C) while solar output was the highest in the past 1000 years.

I”m inclined to say you are incorrect here. The last time the PDO went negative was in the face of record high solar magnetics. Thus, the negative PDO was fighting the sun. When the PDO switched to positive in the 70’s, the sun and PDO were working in concert, thus you got a pretty significant warming. Today, the PDO and sun are going to be working in concert again, but in the opposite direction … low solar activity and magnetics, and negative PDO.

I can see the global temp dropping by a good 0.5C … maybe even more, depending on cycle 25, which everyone is saying will be an even bigger dud than cycle 24.

andrewuwe says:
August 13, 2013 at 12:54 amIt is often said that TSI can’t effect changes in climate because it only varies by 0.1%. But I don’t get this as the global average temp is 287 and one thousandth of that is 0.28. 0.28 is a large cut of the temperature anomaly isn’t it?
The Stefan-Boltzmann radiation law states that radiation depends on the fourth power of temperature, from which is follows that a 0.1% change in radiation corresponds to a change in temperature of one quarter of that, so your 0.28C should be 0.07C.

“JimS
The valid comparison is: TSI may fall by around 0.1%, the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere has increased by around 42% (280 ppm to 400 ppm)”

JimS writes in response: Perhaps you are right, but since 0.1% compares against the total amount of solar radiation, I used the percentage increase for CO2 as compared to the total atmosphere. I am not sure where my analysis falls into one of the following categories – “lies, damn lies, or statistics.”

Dr. Deanster says: “I can see the global temp dropping by a good 0.5C”

You might be right, here’s the fundamental problem, when we wrote our equations for feedback, it was written with predisposed conclusions towards CO2. We really do not know how much of the cooling, 1880-1910, was the drop off in solar activity (equal to solar cycle 24) combined with a negative PDO, how much of the cooling 1940-ish till 1975, was natural neg PDO w/ high solar activity or unnatural aerosols. Then how much of the equal warming .5c 1910-1940 & 1975-2000, was natural or man-made. There is no denying, CO2 can trap heat, then again the last half of the 20th century was characterized by a solar maximum last seen 1000 yrs ago. So how much is natural and how much is from CO2.

The only way to make accurate predictions is to remove predisposed biases towards CO2 and start from scratch!

There are too many variables to discuss solar cause-and-effect, IMO. For one thing, no one knows what lag times are involved, because of the harmonics of addition and subtraction of cycles.

Also, TSI, that is, the relatively low energy electromagnetic energy, probably is not the primary energy to look at when the sun’s influence on climate is attempted to be quantified. High energy waves are by and large neglected, as well as the high energy particles in the solar wind, e.g. neutrinos and protons, that have to give up their energy high in the atmosphere. The discussion seems to focus on the surface of the earth, because of the huge importance of TSI to plants and life in general, I guess.

Toward this observation, that there is “more to the sun that meets the eye” (pun), has anyone plotted and shown, for example, the longer-term variation in solar wind constituents? I realize that much of the data in this regard is fairly recent. It seems to me that the last few years has shown a low velocity of solar wind, sometimes in the 200s level, but I can’t remember seeing constituents being tracked, nor what this may mean historically.

totally agree – but then if the climate boyz can find ‘The AGW Warming’ in all that natural variablilty, hopefully they can find the cooling too! LOL

Doug Allen says:
August 13, 2013 at 5:35 am

absolutely – the solar energy is not just TSI – but probably a zillion other interactions of magnetic influences, x-rays, UVE, etc, etc. Perhaps I should have put /sarc ? – but to be fair, at this stage, AFAIK, nobody, but NOBODY has a sh*tload of applicable modern solar data through a very weak sun yet (?) and so the solar guys must be pretty excited if we start to see some strange readings?.
I for one, still think that the time lags of relatively minor solar effects to earth effects are likely to be in the multidecadal to ‘centuries’ scale – so don’t think we will get any answers soon, but if solar energy (in all its forms) is seen to vary a lot more than some currently think, during the possible quiet phase, it will certainly put the cat amongst the pigeons…..especially as we simply have insufficient data to even model possible ‘solar’ effects. (I can’t see a few decades of solar obs and thermal obs being much use, can you?)
In any event, no doubt the guv’ment/alarmists will come up with some upside down theory, e.g. that we are taking too much solar energy instead of reflecting it back to the sun (to keep it warm), or some such rubbish! to prolong further taxation, etc,etc – damn, that’s another idea I’ve given them…….

Pamela Gray says: August 13, 2013 at 7:28 am
” So why are we discussing frigid or boiling Earth in this thread instead of what the Sun is doing on its own merits?”
History tells us that a few hundred years ago, the little ice age occurred during a time of extended very low solar activity. History is very important and should not be ignored. We are searching to find the link between solar activity and the Earth’s weather. We cannot find the link, but we believe that it exists and we will continue to look.

@ Pamela, the oceans are a powerful influence, no doubt, but only on a short-term basis. The paleo record bears that out. Otherwise, we would not have these alternating cool and warm periods such as the MWP and the LIA. In terms of climate, the sun is the Big Kahuna.

Pamela Gray says:
August 13, 2013 at 7:28 amSo why are we discussing frigid or boiling Earth in this thread instead of what the Sun is doing on its own merits?

Because not many are convinced that the total solar contribution is only 0.1C of warming or cooling from SC min to max and vice versa.
If so then the solar activity to space industry and academia yes, but of no interest to us the ordinary plebs, attending this and a number of other climate blogs.

I have added the latest July, Cycle 24 data to the data set that I have filtered with a 13 month LP filter. These filtered data show a waveform that suggests that the peak in Cycle 24 is near. There is no doubt that cycle 24 will be much smaller than cycle 24. Note that Cycle 23 can be fit very well by a Gaussian with a 6 year time constant and a second Gaussian, only on the fall, with a time constant of 18 years (relative heights are 80 and 60, respectively). There is a very large stochastic content to the Cycle data. This would warn against making too much over any single-month datum. Again, using 13-month smoothing is not good from a signal analysis standpoint. See the Transfer function. Check the web site for plots.

Bruce Cobb says:
August 13, 2013 at 8:44 am
@ Pamela, the oceans are a powerful influence, no doubt, but only on a short-term basis. The paleo record bears that out. Otherwise, we would not have these alternating cool and warm periods such as the MWP and the LIA.

I wouldn’t be so sure of that. Consider what happens at the end of an ice age. A large surge of cold water is injected into the oceans and becomes part of the general circulation. If that relatively cool water resurfaces on 1000 year time scales you have a perfect explanation for the long cycles of warming and cooling. I’m not saying it is the only driver but it sure could have an effect.

@steveta_uk Writes:
“JimS, if you are so sure that .00012% of CO2 cannot have a significant effect, consider that 0.00012% of body weight is very close to the lethal dose of sodium cynanide to a human.

And many other substances are much more toxic than cyanide.

Small amounts of things really can matter.”

JimS responds:
Yes, very small amounts of poison can have a significant affect upon the human body, since poison brings about death.
Since CO2 is not poison or pollution, but is a necessity for life continuing upon this planet, your logic is faulty. Given that earth has experienced significantly higher levels of CO2 for the past 500 million years and life thrived on the earth as a result, your logic goes from being faulty to being the antithesis of logic.
You really should take some time and explore the past history of the earth, as you might find this venture quite illuminating. Listening to Catastrophic Anthropongenic Global Warming extremists, and to no one else, is rather poisonous to the mind.

…As already apparent in UK and Germany the provision of energy is already too high for some domestic customers and 5000 extra deaths were recorded in UK just in March 2013 due to cold and energy poverty – with no political response. IFF the global temperatures do drop the cold winters will be concurrent with extreme increases in energy costs (which will have ‘necessarily sky rocketed’ TM Obama) . Expect progressive politicians at that point to attempt to apportion blame for these deaths probably to the ‘climate science Team’. Nevertheless, their policies and governance can be expected to remain regardless of increasing deaths from cold as they were the long term aim of the AGW scare…..
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Heck Obama is ALREADY SHIFTING BLAME

TOP NEWS TODAY: Climate Change Is Threatening the Power Grid
Just days away from the 10-year anniversary of the worst power outage in U.S. history, the White House and the Energy Department released a report on Monday evaluating the resiliency of the nation’s electric grid and recommending steps to prevent future blackouts. full story

It is also on YAHOO: Climate Change Is Threatening the Power Grid

The report called storms and severe weather “the leading cause of power outages in the United States,” and warned against the steep cost of weather-related damage to the electric grid. It put the price tag for electrical failures caused by inclement weather at between $18 billion and $33 billion annually, and noted that costs have increased in recent years, jumping from a range of $14 billion to $26 billion in 2003 to $27 billion to $52 billion in 2012. Storms exceeding a billion dollars in damages (electrical and otherwise) have also become more frequent in the past decade, as the chart below shows.

Senior administration officials told reporters during a conference call Monday morning that investing in improvements to the grid is the best way to make sure this figure does not continue to rise.

Officials said the electrical distribution system, largely made up of power lines, is the most vulnerable part of the grid….

Tally Ho And Away we go to, wait for it… The SMART GRID Interesting that the report on the Smart Grid is from 2009 but Obama waits until AFTER the election and the start of the hurricane season to blame it on ‘Climate Change’

A smart grid is needed at the distribution level to manage voltage levels, reactive power, potential reverse power flows, and power conditioning, all critical to running grid-connected DG systems, particularly with high penetrations of solar and wind power and PHEVs…. Designing and retrofitting household appliances, such as washers, dryers, and water heaters with technology to communicate and respond to market signals and user preferences via home automation technology will be a significant challenge. Substantial investment will be required….

These controls and tools could reduce the occurrence of outages and power disturbances attributed to grid overload. They could also reduce planned rolling brownouts and blackouts like those implemented during the energy crisis in California in 2000.

….Rolling outages are systematic, temporary interruptions of electrical service.
They are the last step in a progressive series of emergency procedures that ERCOT follows when it detects that there is a shortage of power generation within the Texas electric grid. ERCOT will direct electric transmission and distribution utilities, such as CenterPoint Energy, to begin controlled, rolling outages to bring the supply and demand for electricity back into balance.They generally last 15-45 minutes before being rotated to a different neighborhood to spread the effect of the outage among consumers, which would be the case whether outages are coordinated at the circuit level or individual meter level. Without this safety valve, power generating units could overload and begin shutting down and risk causing a domino effect of a statewide, lengthy outage. With smart meters, CenterPoint Energy is proposing to add a process prior to shutting down whole circuits to conduct a mass turn off of individual meters with 200 amps or less (i.e. residential and small commercial consumers) for 15 or 30 minutes, rotating consumers impacted during that outage as well as possible future outages.

There are several benefits to consumers of this proposed process. By isolating non-critical service accounts (“critical” accounts include hospitals, police stations, water treatment facilities etc.) and spreading “load shed” to a wider distribution, critical accounts that happen to share the same circuit with non-critical accounts will be less affected in the event of an emergency. Curtailment of other important public safety devices and services such as traffic signals, police and fire stations, and water pumps and sewer lifts may also be avoided.

@steveta_uk Writes:
“JimS, if you are so sure that .00012% of CO2 cannot have a significant effect, consider that 0.00012% of body weight is very close to the lethal dose of sodium cynanide to a human.

Steveta uk: Agree with Jim S. Keep in mind, too (speaking strictly toyour example), that CO2 is absolutely ESSENTIAL to human metabolism! Never mind the O2 to CO2 conversion in the respiratory chain—dissolved CO2 (measured as partial pressure, pCO2) acts in the bicarbonate buffering system, maintaining blood pH in the very narrow range of 7.35–7.45. In contrast, the cyanide anion (CN-) displaces and binds irreversibly to various molecules within cells (in the mitochondria), shutting down all cellular respiration, and causing death.

At the top of “strong” solar cycles, the maximum usable frequency (MUF) is around 50 MHz. At the bottom, the MUF is around 10 MHz.

I was eating dinner Sunday with my brother-in and his brother, both ham operators. I mentioned the weakening Sun, and got the impression from Bill that the Sun was interfering more than normal with his ham radio signal, which kind of surprised me. I didn’t realize there was a inverse relationship with MUF.

This is something I already knew thanks to – Science Fiction. Since I know there are other Baen Book readers on this forum from “The Ring of Fire” series I had already been made aware that a period of low or absent sunspots that HAM radio would be affected.

vukcevic says:
August 13, 2013 at 3:55 amI devised a formula, extrapolating to the unusually low solar activity in the late 2020shttp://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/LFC2.htm which is now widely accepted as a likely scenario
No it is not, as your ‘formula’ predicts that the solar polar fields will not reverse in the next cycle. That is not accepted by anybody.

I was pointing out that claming that anything in low concentrations cannot have a major effect is simply wrong. I could just have easily have used a vitamin as an example, or some of the rarer elements we need, where tiny amounts are required for life.

I was not suggesting that CO2 is in any way harmful, nor was I suggesting that CO2 is connected to CAGW.

It’s looks to me like there may be correlation between the DMI above 80 latitude temp and solar activity.
Does anyone know where I could get the daily temps that are used to plot the DMI graphic?
Interpolating from this graph is not useful.

JimS
The valid comparison is: TSI may fall by around 0.1%, the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere has increased by around 42% (280 ppm to 400 ppm)
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>.
So a 0.1% decrease in the Pacific ocean is less water than a 42% decrease in the water in a mud puddle.

I apologize for not understanding your position. However, I have come across too many CAGW extremists who used this same argument that you used. Therefore, I assumed you would be in that category.
Regards

vukcevic says:
August 13, 2013 at 10:18 amUpdated correlation for the evolution of the sun’s magnetic Polar Fields calculates at R^2=0.915
It is not correct to omit MWO as their data is good back to at least 1970 [following an upgrade of the instrument], as you can see from the close relationship with WSO when they overlap: slide 20 of http://www.leif.org/research/On-Becoming-a-Scientist.pdf

Leif Svalgaard says:
August 13, 2013 at 9:56 am vukcevic says:
August 13, 2013 at 3:55 am
“I devised a formula, extrapolating to the unusually low solar activity in the late 2020shttp://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/LFC2.htm
which is now widely accepted as a likely scenario”
No it is not, as your ‘formula’ predicts that the solar polar fields will not reverse in the next cycle. That is not accepted by anybody.

Hi doc
That remains to be seen, maybe or maybe not, anyway as you correctly quoted I said:
….” extrapolating to the unusually low solar activity in the late 2020s” which indeed is now widely accepted as a likely scenario, I didn’t say anything about the PF reversal, but if it did not occur I would be first one to be surprised by the accuracy of the extrapolation.
Now you mentioned it, I intend to put away one bottle champaign and one bottle of French plonk 2003 vintage, just in case. Both will be consumed with pleasure in the memory of my folly or otherwise, around 2024/5 whatever the sun and its polar fields do.
This is all done for fun, I leave the serious stuff to Dr. Hathaway and good yourself.
Cheers.

@bubbagyro
“Also, TSI, that is, the relatively low energy electromagnetic energy, probably is not the primary energy to look at when the sun’s influence on climate is attempted to be quantified. High energy waves are by and large neglected, as well as the high energy particles in the solar wind, e.g. neutrinos and protons, …”

The “T” in TSI stands for “total”, so accounts for _all_ of the electromagnetic radiation (EMR) energy radiated by the Sun (from low-frequency RF up to X-ray and gamma radiation). Most of this EMR is in the visible light spectrum and nearby IR and UV bands, according to its black-body temperature (~5800K) and the Planck distribution:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planck's_law

Yes, this is mathematic model, but solar EMR observations fit the model very well.

The most reliable TSI measurements are made by the orbiting NASA SORCE/TIM instrument, which measures temperature changes caused capturing all solar radiation impinging on its ‘sensor’. The ‘sensor’ is actually a small aperture on the surface of an insulated calorimeter chamber. Because the diameter of the hole is relatively small compared to the size of the chamber, virtually all of the admitted EMR is absorbed by chamber and converted to heat, i.e. simulating an ideal black-body which, by definition, absorbs all incoming radiation.http://glory.giss.nasa.gov/tim/

Energy radiated by other forms of solar energy, e.g. particles is a small fraction of the solar EMR solar output. For example, solar neutrinos constitute 3% of total solar energy. But neutrinos barely interact with other forms of matter and so do not get absorbed by the atmosphere or Earth’s surface.

vukcevic says:
August 13, 2013 at 10:35 am“No it is not, as your ‘formula’ predicts that the solar polar fields will not reverse in the next cycle. That is not accepted by anybody.”

That remains to be seen
It does not remain to be seen whether your ‘prediction’ of no reversal is accepted. It simply is not.

I didn’t say anything about the PF reversal
Your ‘formula’ does. The sign is a large part of the correlation. Here you can see the effect of correlating 200 random number with their ordinal number. The first 100 are made negative. You get a hefty [and generally considered valid] correlation. Remove the sign and there is no correlation [the numbers are random]. So, in order to evaluate your correlation use MWO back to 1970 [the comined MWO+WSO series] and remove the sign [if you say that the sign does not matter]. Anything else is just junky ‘fun’ as you call it.

Reality check. Solar-anything driving weather pattern variation is easily refuted. A strong El Nino (which actually spits out heat from the oceans, thus cooling them) can warm things up on land in the face of a weak solar cycle. Therefore Oceanic conditions are more powerful than solar affects…..
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Pam, you haven’t followed that back to where that strong El Nino comes from. The Drakes Passage constricts the Antarctic Circumpolar Current and shoots some of the cold Antarctic water up the coast of South America where El Nino/La Nina originates. The Antarctic Circumpolar Current is driven by wind.

Ozone Thinning Has Changed Ocean Circulation“Jan. 31, 2013 — A hole in the Antarctic ozone layer has changed the way that waters in the southern oceans mix,… In a paper published in this week’s issue of the journal Science, Darryn W. Waugh and his team show that subtropical intermediate waters in the southern oceans have become “younger” as the upwelling, circumpolar waters have gotten “older” — changes that are consistent with the fact that surface winds have strengthened as the ozone layer has thinned. “

NASA: Ozone Production and Destruction
Stratospheric ozone is created and destroyed primarily by ultraviolet radiation. The air in the stratosphere is bombarded continuously with ultraviolet radiation from the Sun.When high energy ultraviolet rays strike molecules of ordinary oxygen (O2), they split the molecule into two single oxygen atoms. The free oxygen atoms can then combine with oxygen molecules (O2) to form ozone (O3) molecules….

Ozone production is driven by UV radiation of wavelengths less than 240 nm. Ozone dissociation typically produces atomic oxygen that is stable when exposed to longer wavelengths, up to 320 nm, and shorter wavelenghts of 400 to 700 nm. Longer wavelength photons penetrate deeper into the atmosphere, creating regions of ozone production and destruction. When an ozone molecule absorbs even low energy ultraviolet, it splits into an ordinary oxygen molecule and a free oxygen atom….

WASHINGTON — A NASA-led study has documented an unprecedented depletion of Earth’s protective ozone layer above the Arctic last winter and spring caused by an unusually prolonged period of extremely low temperatures in the stratosphere.

The study, published online Sunday in the journal Nature, finds the amount of ozone destroyed in the Arctic in 2011 was comparable to that seen in some years in the Antarctic, where an ozone “hole” has formed each spring since the mid 1980s. The stratospheric ozone layer, extending from about 10 to 20 miles (15 to 35 kilometers) above the surface…

In recent years, SIM has collected data that suggest the sun’s brightness may vary in entirely unexpected ways. If the SIM’s spectral irradiance measurements are validated and proven accurate over time, then certain parts of Earth’s atmosphere may receive surprisingly large doses of solar radiation even during lulls in solar activity.

“We have never had a reason until now to believe that parts of the spectrum may vary out of phase with the solar cycle…

Some of the variations that SIM has measured in the last few years do not mesh with what most scientists expected. Climatologists have generally thought that the various part of the spectrum would vary in lockstep with changes in total solar irradiance.

However, SIM suggests that ultraviolet irradiance fell far more than expected between 2004 and 2007 — by ten times as much as the total irradiance did — while irradiance in certain visible and infrared wavelengths surprisingly increased, even as solar activity wound down overall.

The steep decrease in the ultraviolet, coupled with the increase in the visible and infrared, does even out to about the same total irradiance change as measured by the TIM during that period, according to the SIM measurements.

The stratosphere absorbs most of the shorter wavelengths of ultraviolet light, but some of the longest ultraviolet rays (UV-A), as well as much of the visible and infrared portions of the spectrum, directly heat Earth’s lower atmosphere and can have a significant impact on the climate….

John Day says:
August 13, 2013 at 10:37 amEnergy radiated by other forms of solar energy, e.g. particles is a small fraction of the solar EMR solar output.
Indeed, the total energy of the solar wind, cosmic rays, and solar energetic particles is less than 1/100th of a W/m2.

Leif Svalgaard says:
August 13, 2013 at 10:48 am
vukcevic says:
August 13, 2013 at 10:35 am
(LS) “No it is not, as your ‘formula’ predicts that the solar polar fields will not reverse in the next cycle. That is not accepted by anybody.”

(Vuk) That remains to be seen
(LS) It does not remain to be seen whether your ‘prediction’ of no reversal is accepted. It simply is not.
………………..
Doc
You just have to go and buy yourself a new hat.
I have enlarged the relevant section and added to the graphhttp://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/PF.htm
and as you can see formula does predict reversal, albeit a short one, but reversal is a reversal. ‘Vukcevic formula rules. OK!’

Gail Combs says:
August 13, 2013 at 10:56 amNASA SORCE’s Solar Spectral Surprise
In recent years, SIM has collected data that suggest the sun’s brightness may vary in entirely unexpected ways.
Recent work suggests that the surprise is due to calibration problems with the SIM, no probably no surprise.

vukcevic says:
August 13, 2013 at 11:06 amand as you can see formula does predict reversal, albeit a short one, but reversal is a reversal.
And since a solar cycle [from max to max] is from reversal to reversal, your ‘formula’ predicts maximum for cycle 25 to be in 2023 and maximum for solar cycle 26 to be in 2025 only 2 years later. Can you see why your argument is ridiculous?

How many times are they going to fail in their predictions before they start a rethink? The attitude does seem to be fingers in ears eyes tightly shut shouting bla, bla, bla, bla, bla….it’s not the Sun, it’s not the Sun! Reminds me of Lenin,” if you tell a lie often enough, it becomes the truth!”

Also once something has become “dogma”. It can take a lot to change opinions. In many cases (be they “religion”, “politics”, even “science” & “medicine”) obviously wrong beliefs have only changed once enough believers have died of old age.

Gail, energy bills will skyrocket, us poor folks can’t win for losing. Here’s something I put together, not near as good as you do it because I’m so time constrained. Copy and paste. But something you can chew on.

Looking back at annualized growth in federal spending, the biggest spender was Ronald Reagan (8.7%) followed closely by Bush II (8.1%), Bush I (5.4%), and Bill Clinton (3.2%). As a matter of fact, even Clinton’s low of 3.2% federal spending growth is nearly two-and-a-half times higher than President Obama’s 1.4% during his first term in office.

One simple fact Republicans understand, but many in the population do not, is that the first year of every presidential term starts with a previous administration’s budget approved by Congress. Republicans began their lying by counting 2009′s fiscal year budget as the President’s even though it began four months before he moved into the White House, and included spending increases of hundreds of billions of dollars in response to Bush-Republicans’ economic and financial catastrophe. In the 2009 fiscal year budget, the last of George W. Bush’s presidency, federal spending rose by 17.9% from $2.98 trillion to $3.52 trillion, and the first budget attributable to President Obama (fiscal 2010), spending fell 1.8% to $3.46 trillion. In fiscal 2013, the final budget of the President’s first term, spending is scheduled to fall 1.3% to $3.58 trillion according to the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO), and extended out means that over the President’s first four budget years, federal spending is on track to rise from $3.52 trillion to $3.58 trillion, an annualized increase of just 0.4%. Obviously, there has been no huge increase in spending under President Obama, and yet Republicans claim he has been on a spending binge that is the sole cause of the nation’s economic woes.

The utter failure of Republicans is acknowledging that President Obama is stingy with federal dollars, and that their spending cut propensity is directly correlated to which party is in the White House. Republicans had no problem blowing up the deficit when Bush II was in the White House, and most Americans are unaware that Bush’s folly in Iraq and Afghanistan were kept out of the budget and still old George and Republicans presided over the second highest federal spending increase since Reagan was president. President Obama gave Republicans a good offer to avoid the dreaded fiscal cliff that included over $800 billion in spending cuts they hardly considered adequate because in their world view, one can never cut enough from services and safety nets.

It is a hard pill for Republicans to swallow, but this President has reduced spending to the point that there is little left to cut without causing more undue harm to tens-of-millions of Americans. However, one must remember that causing harm to the poor, children, Veterans, and seniors is the prime directive of Republicans and their policy machine the Heritage Foundation, and regardless that President Obama leads the pack in reducing spending, Republicans and Heritage will always find more ways to punish Americans whether it is robbing them of their Social Security retirement accounts, cutting food stamps, cutting healthcare spending, slashing Veterans benefits, or eliminating school lunch programs that not only reduces spending, it reduces life expectancy.

1) Conservatives opposed the American Revolution

Conservatives vehemently warned us that it was unnatural to rebel to our Sovereign Lord, King George III, and that doing so would plunge the colonies into disorder. They assured us, as the father of Conservatism, Edmund Burke echoed, that social stability would only come from the small group of wealthy aristocrats ruling over the poor majority. Conservatives reiterated that it was the duty of the poor to obey their “betters.” Their rewards, after all, will come in Heaven.

2) Conservatives opposed freeing the slaves
It is interesting to note that, in 1860, the Democrats were the real conservatives, while the Republicans were the left-leaning radicals.

Lincoln believed that rich Americans should pay more than their less wealthy friends and neighbors.

But, because they are CONS and want to rig the system in their favor, they only considered slaves “people” for purposes of counting them in order to increase the slave-state representation in Congress.

Conservatives warned that freeing the slaves, believe it or not, was an affront to liberty – as well as an evil government plot to force hardworking business owners to release their property. After all, as the Bible tells us, and as Rush Limbaugh later reminded us, “some people are just born to be slaves.”
3) Conservatives opposed women’s suffrage
4) Conservatives opposed minimum wage and child labor laws, the 8-hour work day, weekends, sick leave… etc.
5) Conservatives opposed humane treatment of animals
6) Conservatives opposed the Social Security Act
7) Conservatives oppose clean air and water
8 ) Conservatives opposed the Civil Right’s Act
9) Conservatives opposed Medicare
10) Conservatives oppose Equal Protection Under the Law

The Stefan-Boltzmann radiation law states that radiation depends on the fourth power of temperature, from which is follows that a 0.1% change in radiation corresponds to a change in temperature of one quarter of that, so your 0.28C should be 0.07C.

Leif

What has always bothered me about your focus soley on TSI is related to the ultraviolet variations. If, as the AGW hypothesis suggests, that a minor atmospheric trace gas can effect temperatures so much due to the resonant coupling of the absorption/emission spectra with those molecules bandgap energy, why then can’t the strong couplings with oxygen in the ultraviolet spectrum not have a similar effect? Thus if those wavelengths are suppressed with cycle variances that we know are there, which can easily be seen in exoatmospheric density variations, why can’t are hypotheses related to this well known and tested by data phenomenon dismissed?

We also see evidence for the eleven year and other cycles of the sun’s output in many many climate proxies, thus there must be something missing in this focus simply on TSI.

Leif Svalgaard says:
August 13, 2013 at 11:14 amvukcevic says:
August 13, 2013 at 11:06 am
and as you can see formula does predict reversal, albeit a short one, but reversal is a reversal.
“And since a solar cycle [from max to max] is from reversal to reversal, your ‘formula’ predicts maximum for cycle 25 to be in 2023 and maximum for solar cycle 26 to be in 2025 only 2 years later. Can you see why your argument is ridiculous?”
…………….
It is exactly what happened at the time of the Dalton Minimum if transposed to the Polar Fields few years earlierhttp://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/PF.htm
Thanks for the challenge.

. Let’s review what happened during low sunspot or lower solar flux activity according to historical CET temperature records. I seriously question the claim of only 0.1C drop due to the sun during solar minimums .

Record CET Coldest winter temperatures during major solar minimums
19 of the 30 coldest annual CET temperatures were during the three very low sunspot periods of Maunder Minimum. Dalton Minimum and the Modern Minimum of 1880-1910
20 of the 30 coldest winter CET temperatures were during the same three major minimums, regular minimums, or sustained low solar sunspot years

During Maunder minimum and looking at CET temperature data 1645-1715
The period 1690-1699, the coldest decade, had an average annual temperature of 8.107C. The average annual decade temperature during 1981-2010 was 9.9 C. The annual average temperature 1940-1979 [the era before global warming was 9.48C] The annual average temperature shortly after MM, namely 1720-1729 was 9.3 C and 1730-1739 was 9.8 C. So on an annual basis the temperatures dropped about 1.2 -1.7C during MM
During Dalton Minimum [1790-1720
The same analysis of the period 1807-1816 during the Dalton Minimum shows annual temperatures of about 8.6C when annual sunspot number was zero during 1810. The winter of 1814 was the 4th coldest in CET records at – 2.9 C again -5.3C colder than 2010

During other low solar activity periods

If we further check the record, global temperatures tend to drop near the end of long solar cycles and at the beginning of the next decade. One can see the global temperatures decline at the end of cycles # 9, 13, 14, and 20.

If we also check the impact on Northern Hemisphere winter temperatures as measured by Hadcrutgl3, the temperatures drops for 3-4 years around each of the last 3 solar minimums or whenever the solar flux F 10.7 level drops to between 100 and 70 [ unless there happens to be an El Nino during the same years] Just check the years 2009, 2010 2011

CET Winter temperatures dropped at the solar minimum year or the years before or after for 30 of the last 31 solar minimums.

Thus we note that these historical temperature drops during low solar activity are significantly more than -0.1 C when looking at winter temperatures

If the sun is not somehow involved in these changes , the so called “other climate factors “ must have a very smart calendar to come on and off each time the sun drops to a certain threshold after a sustained and declining period of about 5-10 years .

vukcevic says:
August 13, 2013 at 11:22 amNo it is not ridiculous, your attempt to discredit product of my ‘fertile imagination’ is
Why not ask Ilya Usoskin or Kalevi Mursula? Cycle 4a lasted only 3 years
A bit of honesty would do you good. If you would care to check, they say 7 years. And their 4a cycle has already been discredited and gone the way of the Dodo, e.g. http://www.mps.mpg.de/homes/natalie/PAPERS/cycle4.pdf “Taken together, the evidence from these various tests strongly suggests that no cycle was missed and that the oﬃcial sunspot cycle numbering and parameters are correct”

But back to the issue. You predict that the maximum of cycle 26 will occur only two years after the maximum of cycle 25. so when will the minimum be? halfway between the two maxima? in 2024? that gives SC25 only one year to descend from maximum to minimum. You are stretching things a bit too much here. But such is the lot of a pseudo-scientist. Sooner or later, reality catches up with him. Most of the time he will ignore that and invent so excuse. What will be yours?

It is exactly what happened at the time of the Dalton Minimum if transposed to the Polar Fields few years earlierhttp://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/PF.htm
You may not observe any sunspots at location at the time of observations of Dalton Minimum, and even if were some, they will be obscured by frequent cloud cover (Svensmark effect)
Bye.

Wow, this thread is one of the most confrontational I have ever read here at WUWT.
Sure, Leif and Vuk like to dance but everyone here seems at loggerheads.

Just think on this.
We don’t know how the Sun works.
We don’t know how (or maybe if) the Sun affects Earth’s temperature changes.

But we all want to know.

To conclude, remember what Alan the Brit talked about.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eyam
The people of Eyam faced the Black death with dignity for the benefit of the rest of the world.
If we all have that spirit then it won’t matter to civilisation what the Sun does; mankind will do fine.

Ed,
I agree with almost all the above, but most of the younger conservatives here are probably not aware of the above history, and it’s unfair to paint them with the same brush as former generation conservatives. I’m one of those center left- I prefer that term- luke warmers who is very upset by the liberal establishment’s groupthink and uncritical embrace of CAGW, but equally upset by much of the right wing groupthink and uncritical embrace of conspiracy theories about liberal CAGW motivations. The belief we know other’s motivations is like the belief we know the future of global warming and cooling- self satisfying, but unhelpful.
“Some say the world will end in fire
Some say in ice.
From what I’ve tasted of desire,
I hold with those who favor fire,
But if it had to perish twice,
I think that for destruction, ice
Is also great and would suffice.”
Robert Frost

Dennis Ray Wingo says:
August 13, 2013 at 11:42 amWhat has always bothered me about your focus soley on TSI is related to the ultraviolet variations.
UV variations follow TSI and the sunspot number generally. TSI is where the energy is and is where everybody [e.g. Jack Eddy] thought the influence would come from up until we found that TSI does not vary enough. Then other mechanisms [UV, feedback, unspecified ‘amplifications’, ‘unknown processes, magic, etc] were invented instead of following standard scientific practice when dealing with data not matching expectations.

We also see evidence for the eleven year and other cycles of the sun’s output in many many climate proxies, thus there must be something missing in this focus simply on TSI.
TSI is only an indicator for all the other solar outputs. They vary to first order like TSI [or perhaps it is TSI that is the result of all the rest – doesn’t matter]. The so-called evidence is weak and unconvincing, otherwise there would be no debate. All correlations I have seen over the past 40 years I have studied this problem have failed in one way or other, perhaps you can show me one that have worked having error bars and significance [and sound analysis – e.g. no cherry picking] that is compelling.

vukcevic says:
August 13, 2013 at 12:04 pmYou may not observe any sunspots at location at the time of observations of Dalton Minimum, and even if were some, they will be obscured by frequent cloud cover
So now you are suggesting that the cause of Grand Minima is frequent cloud cover. So, climate is controlling the Sun [or at least our record of it]. More ‘fertile imagination’ it seems.

Leif Svalgaard says:
August 13, 2013 at 11:56 amBut back to the issue. You predict that the maximum of cycle 26 will occur only two years after the maximum of cycle 25. so when will the minimum be? halfway between the two maxima? in 2024? that gives SC25 only one year to descend from maximum to minimum. You are stretching things a bit too much here. But such is the lot of a pseudo-scientist.

I am not scientist, just an ordinary Joe Blog, looking at the data, I don’t predict anything, I am not in such business, I am just reporting to what my equation extrapolates to.
It is exactly what happened at the time of the Dalton Minimum if transposed to the Polar Fields few years earlier as anyone can see here, by comparing twohttp://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/PF.htm
You may not observe any sunspots at location at the time of observations of Dalton Minimum, and even if were some, they will be obscured by frequent cloud cover (Svensmark effect)

I do not know what might happen or not, I think neither you.
Let me say it again:
In 2003 (published January 2004) I devised a formula, extrapolating to the unusually low solar activity in the late 2020s, which is now widely accepted as a likely scenario, but then ridiculed by the most eminent solar scientists (from NASA to Stanford) with lone exception of a British academic also a winner of the Hale Prize, awarded by the Solar Physics Division of the American Astronomical Society.

And that is as the current state is, you may not like it, you may wriggle back and fourth to get out of the hole you fell in (further up the thread).

vukcevic says:
August 13, 2013 at 12:33 pmIn 2003 (published January 2004) I devised a formula, extrapolating to the unusually low solar activity in the late 2020s, which is now widely accepted as a likely scenario
Repeating stuff does not make it true. The result of the formula [e.g. sign of the field and timing of reversals and its behavior back in time] is not accepted by anybody. That cycle 24 would be small was predicted by my little grandson [then five years old] when he saw [an earlier version of] http://sidc.be/sunspot-index-graphics/wolfaml.php

You went [predictably] quiet on this:Why not ask Ilya Usoskin or Kalevi Mursula? Cycle 4a lasted only 3 years
A bit of honesty would do you good. If you would care to check, they say 7 years. And their 4a cycle has already been discredited and gone the way of the Dodo, e.g. http://www.mps.mpg.de/homes/natalie/PAPERS/cycle4.pdf “Taken together, the evidence from these various tests strongly suggests that no cycle was missed and that the oﬃcial sunspot cycle numbering and parameters are correct”

But back to the issue. You predict that the maximum of cycle 26 will occur only two years after the maximum of cycle 25. so when will the minimum be? halfway between the two maxima? in 2024? that gives SC25 only one year to descend from maximum to minimum. You are stretching things a bit too much here. But such is the lot of a pseudo-scientist. Sooner or later, reality catches up with him. Most of the time he will ignore that and invent some excuse. What will be yours?

Leif Svalgaard says:
August 13, 2013 at 12:23 pm
“You may not observe any sunspots at location at the time of observations of Dalton Minimum, and even if were some, they will be obscured by frequent cloud cover” So now you are suggesting that the cause of Grand Minima is frequent cloud cover. So, climate is controlling the Sun [or at least our record of it]. More ‘fertile imagination’ it seems.

Now, now, doc, you do not want readers to get wrong impression of your ways, do you now?
What happened to reference to the Svensmark effect?
Correct quote is:
“You may not observe any sunspots at location at the time of observations of Dalton Minimum, and even if were some, they will be obscured by frequent cloud cover (Svensmark effect)”
and here is the relevant graph:http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/PF.htm
a good case study.
I think it is best if I decline any further conversation until you mend your ways.

vukcevic says:
August 13, 2013 at 12:33 pmI am not scientist, just an ordinary Joe Blog, looking at the data, I don’t predict anything, I am not in such business, I am just reporting to what my equation extrapolates to.
It is exactly what happened at the time of the Dalton Minimum if transposed to the Polar Fields few years earlier as anyone can see here, by comparing twohttp://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/PF.htm
You may not observe any sunspots at location at the time of observations of Dalton Minimum, and even if were some, they will be obscured by frequent cloud cover
So Joe Blog suggests that there were two solar maxima [during the Dalton Minimum], one in 1809 and one in 1811, but the spots were not seen because of clouds…
A much more likely explanation is simply that the formula is wrong and it is all hogwash, right?

I am still happy with Willis and his Thermostat Hypothesis. What Sun and CO2 worshippers seem to miss is that neither, within current bounds of variability, can do much to change the LT temps.

So long as the equatorial timing Willis identified is not taken, by CO2/TSI/Unicorn Farts, beyond the 6am to 6pm limit then arguing about 10ths of a degree is just that. 15C +/- 0.3 over 30 years. Jeez people, get a life, if I could design a system that would control the ST of a planet to those tolerances then I might want my Nobel Prize at some point. Now!

vukcevic says:
August 13, 2013 at 12:49 pmNow, now, doc, you do not want readers to get wrong impression of your ways, do you now?
Have you no shame?

Correct quote is:
“You may not observe any sunspots at location at the time of observations of Dalton Minimum, and even if were some, they will be obscured by frequent cloud cover (Svensmark effect)”
Hoyt&Schatten retrieved all sunspot observations from back then and record the number of spots on each day [as seen by the combined effort of 5-7 observers]. Here is what they found http://www.leif.org/research/GSN-Daily-1809-1811.png As you can see of the 730 days there were no observations on only 17 days [and all in 1809]. You are suggesting that the solar maximum in 1809 fall on those 17 days [like the British saying that ‘summer fell last Tuesday’].

I think it is best if I decline any further conversation until you mend your ways
I wish that would come to pass. As you are wasting everybody’s time here.

I remember that as a child I was fascinated by the planets and stars, but after hearing the lessons, they always seem so distant and cold to me. I never thought that they could hold a key to our life here on earth. The 2 graphs here

represent almost all of my data on maximum temps. Note that an a-c curve consists of 4 quadrants, for each full wave. In my best fit, I saw that each quadrant has a time span of about 22 years, on average. In the paper from that I quoted frequently from William Arnold, he suggests that it is mainly the position of the two planets Saturn and Uranus that can be directly linked to the 22 year solar cycle. I looked at this again. At first the dates did not make sense.

Then I put the dates of the various positions of Uranus and Saturn next to it:

1) we had/have Saturn synodical with Uranus (i.e. in line with each other)

1897, 1942, 1988, 2032

2) we had complete 180 degrees opposition between Saturn and Uranus

1919, 1965, 2009,

In all 7 of my own results & projections, there is an exact 7 or 8 years delay, before “the push/pull ” occurs, that switches the dynamo inside the sun, changing the sign….!!!! Conceivably the gravitational pull of these two planets has some special lob sided character, causing the actual switch. Perhaps Uranus’ apparent side ward motion (inclination of equator by 98 degrees) works like a push-pull trigger. Either way, there is a clear correlation. Other synodical cycles of planets probably have some interference as well either delaying or extending the normal cycle time a little bit. So it appears William Arnold report was right after all….(“On the Special Theory of Order”, 1985).

Leif , this cycle is going to be as weak or weaker then solar cycle 5, and then you will see how solar climatic relationships really do correlate, if the duration of time and the degree of magnitude of solar variation reaches certain critical sustainable parameters..

Then again I don’t think you subscribe to thresholds or that the climate can change abruptly or that the climate system is non linear. In addition I think you under estimate solar variability.

Salvatore Del Prete says:
August 13, 2013 at 1:14 pmThen again I don’t think you subscribe to thresholds or that the climate can change abruptly or that the climate system is non linear. In addition I think you under estimate solar variability.
You ‘think’ this and you ‘think’ that. You are allowed to have your own opinion, but without anything to back it up, it is just opinion, and I ‘think’ we have seen enough of your opinion to know now what it is.

You , or for that matter no one in the field of climatalogy can back up their opinions. It is all spin and if one spins it hard enough you can make it appear to be correct.

I can make any theory seem correct if I spin it, even the AGW theory.

What I am trying to say is we may have the once in a lifetime oportunity (this decade)to sort much of this out given the prolonged solar minimum versus co2 increases, and the resulting climate as a consequence of all of this.

My thoughts if anything can be backed up more then the AGW theory which is failing on all cylinders as this decade proceeds. They can not or I should say have failed so far to back up any claims they have made thus far.

Leif Svalgaard says:
August 13, 2013 at 1:13 pmvukcevic says:
August 13, 2013 at 12:49 pm
Now, now, doc, you do not want readers to get wrong impression of your ways, do you now?

Have you no shame?
…………..
That is good for a laugh. You shouldn’t be making up things
“So, climate is controlling the Sun.”
in defence of your failure
and then you have a cheek to say: “Have you no shame?”

I don’t really care what Hoyt & Schatten retrieved or not, in the bottom graphhttp://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/PF.htm
is monthly data from SIDC.
Further more I have no idea what Hoyt & Schatten were doing during Napoleonic wars in Europe, but many contemporary records talk of incessant rain and muddy battlefields.

Vukcevic has shown: His equation is good, polar fields reverse, repeat of Dalton minimum (214 =2x 107 years, yet another Vukcevic equation )
Dr. Svalgaard badly failed to prove any of his assertions and resorts to. “So, climate is controlling the Sun.” selective and trncated quote in defence of his failure, followed by impertinent “Have you no shame?”

I make that
Vukcevic 3 (three) : Dr. Svalgaard -1 (minus one)
Off you go to a battle where you have some chance of winning, you lost this one rather badly!

Salvatore Del Prete says:
August 13, 2013 at 1:32 pmLeif, why do you want to suppress opinions?
I object to opinions about my opinion and my person, like “Leif, you do not understand…”, “Leif, you have no clue”, “Leif, you know nothing about climate…”, “Leif is not being honest…”, “Leif is also trying to say …”, etc, etc.

I named some highly regarded scientist the other day that do not see it your way.
Some of those people are not scientists and some are not ‘highly regarded’.

I opine on things I know something about and correct flim-flam [Vuk is a sterling example, Geoff would be another, and you know the rest of the list] in those areas. And, as they say, I ‘do not suffer fools gladly’.

vukcevic says:
August 13, 2013 at 2:05 pmI don’t really care what Hoyt & Schatten retrieved or not
Typical of a pseudo-scientist to not care about data that doesn’t fit. The fact is that out of the 730 days in 1809 and 1811 there were observations by FLAUGERGUES, HERSCHEL, HEINRICH, FRITSCH, BUGGE, GRUITHUISEN, ENDE, BODE, and LINDENER, covering all these 730 days except 17. That is the solar data we have. I consider that disproof of your formula and of your claim that the two solar maxima you predicted [1809, 1811] could not be observed because of clouds. The Svensmark ‘effect’ would actually not explain anything as that should operate at solar minimum [most cosmic rays] rather than at maximum.

Leif Svalgaard says: August 13, 2013 at 1:13 pmAs you can see of the 730 days there were no observations on only 17 days [and all in 1809].

Only 17 days ?! presumably due to cloudy sky, were this observations made from the Atakama desert, or Europe was at the time of the Dalton minimum and the Napoleonic wars a land of ever lasting sunshine ?

vukcevic says:
August 13, 2013 at 2:20 pmOnly 17 days ?! presumably due to cloudy sky, were this observations made from the Atakama desert, or Europe was at the time of the Dalton minimum and the Napoleonic wars a land of ever lasting sunshine ?
From the muddy locations at Viviers, France; London, England; Munich, Germany; Copenhagen, Denmark; Celle, Germany; Berlin, Germany; Glatz, Poland.

vukcevic says:
August 13, 2013 at 2:39 pmOr SC max =1.5 (one point five !)
And you call that Solar cycle’s Max !?
Perhaps your PFs are just wrong.
Now you have gone quiet on what matters:Why not ask Ilya Usoskin or Kalevi Mursula? Cycle 4a lasted only 3 years
A bit of honesty would do you good. If you would care to check, they say 7 years. And their 4a cycle has already been discredited and gone the way of the Dodo, e.g. http://www.mps.mpg.de/homes/natalie/PAPERS/cycle4.pdf “Taken together, the evidence from these various tests strongly suggests that no cycle was missed and that the oﬃcial sunspot cycle numbering and parameters are correct”

But back to the issue. You predict that the maximum of cycle 26 will occur only two years after the maximum of cycle 25. so when will the minimum be? halfway between the two maxima? in 2024? that gives SC25 only one year to descend from maximum to minimum. You are stretching things a bit too much here. But such is the lot of a pseudo-scientist. Sooner or later, reality catches up with him. Most of the time he will ignore that and invent some excuse. What will be yours?

I have studied this problem have failed in one way or other, perhaps you can show me one that have worked having error bars and significance [and sound analysis – e.g. no cherry picking] that is compelling.

Then look at the height and density in the exosphere. Known to vary quite a bit from solar cycle to solar cycle. The smallest extent of the exosphere in the space era was the 23/24 minimum. That is direct experimental evidence of some influence from the variance in short wavelength radiation.

denniswingo says:
August 13, 2013 at 2:58 pmThen look at the height and density in the exosphere. Known to vary quite a bit from solar cycle to solar cycle. The smallest extent of the exosphere in the space era was the 23/24 minimum. That is direct experimental evidence of some influence from the variance in short wavelength radiation.
And of the ionosphere even below the exosphere. But those are not involved in climate apart from possibly being influenced a bit by upward travelling waves from the troposphere.

I don’t think that there is one single element that is compelling, one way or another in this equation. The solar/terrestrial interface has dozens of variables and if you look through geologic history it is clear that those that many think are dominant, whether it is milankovitch, CO2, solar radiation, all have counter examples of when they did not dominate.

Usually in the engineering world that means that there are several lesser influences that interact in unexpected ways against each other. This is why Hansen’s empirical relationship between CO2 and air temperature doesn’t work. It is also why solar variation at 40k years worked for a while and then did not and 100k year took over. This is why your focus on the one parameter, TSI is also not compelling as the faint Earth paradox shows. Thus it is incumbent upon all of us who study these things to integrate what is happening and keep an open mind. Using computer models of CO2, no matter how fancy, is nothing more today than an advanced appeal to an authority, one that is also flawed.

vukcevic says:
August 13, 2013 at 2:39 pmPF estimated at [abs (-2.2)] (see bottom graph http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/PF.htm )
As usual you become economical with the truth at some point. The red curve you show [including the formula you presumably used to calculate it] does not match what the formula actually returns, as you can see here: http://www.leif.org/research/Vuk-Failing-16.png
Furthermore the reversal [indicated by vertical bars] bear no relationship with solar maximum nor with the size of the sunspot cycle following each.

@Ed Mertin –
Among other errors, you conflate today’s reactionary left with those radical Republicans of the Civil War era.

Today’s true liberals are, for the most part, the people called conservative: they are the ones who support civil liberties against government encroachment and wish people to keep the largest possible share of what they earn. In 1961 these would be the supporters of the Kennedy tax cut and in 1964 the Civil Rights Act (for which considerably more Republicans than Democrats voted)

Today’s “liberals,” and the Kleptocrat Party generally, are anything but liberal in the true sense of the word. They proceed from authoritarian impulses and have as their model the failed genocidal models of socialism. They seek to control every detail of our lives and take the bread we earn for their frivolous, entirely personal purposes. AGW is the centerpiece of their rationale for doing this, and its objective is to enrich a small elite (der Fuehrer’s crony capitalist buddies, and people like BloodyMess) while reducing the rest of us to dependence and poverty. It is also to commit genocide, with regard to which their intent is clear from their unquestionable knowledge of the deaths and suffering caused by measures to control carbon dioxide.

@Chris Wright –
There is an alternative to waiting for the new LIA to set in – it is to get the message out to low-income people what AGW, and der Fuehrer’s programs, will mean for them – and for their grandchildren. Lateesha Thomas and Yolanda Perez, 40-something grandmothers living in dangerous neighborhoods, trying to scrape by on the income of a grocery clerk and a hospital housekeeper, can be shown quite plainly what $10 gasoline and 40 cent electricity will do to them and the grandkids they are trying to raise and care for and feed and clothe and keep warm in winter – and they can be told exactly how their beloved Fuehrer’s policies are doing that to them. Dr. Spencer’s comment about poor people’s hardships at Gauleiter Boxer’s Senate committee meeting was a start, but the Kleptocrat party members of the committee, all being super-rich, won’t pay any attention to such details – heck, if you’re worth $100 mill, why would you care if gas is $10 a gallon? It won’t be easy, but the word has to be gotten to these people who got suckered into voting for a bounder like der Fuehrer.

One of the most offensive things about every dimension of AGW and its religionists is the utter callousness, even the willingness to commit mass murder, that they exhibit at every turn – while whining about “saving the planet for our grandchildren.” What about those grandchildren here, now, today, being raised by the Ms. Thomases and Ms. Perezes of this world? What kind of world will be left for them, if we are taken back into the Stone Age? Don’t they deserve better than that?

The whole AGW meme is so obscene, so filthy, so ugly that there is no word in any language foul enough to capture the evil of it – or of the @#$%&*!!’s who are pushing it. I am not a religious believer but often I find myself wishing for a Hell that these people can be cast into.

denniswingo says:
August 13, 2013 at 3:25 pmThis is why your focus on the one parameter, TSI is also not compelling
I’m not focusing on a single parameter, TSI. As I noted, all solar parameters vary to first order just as TSI, so you can substitute any parameter you want for TSI, makes no difference for the correlations.

Thus it is incumbent upon all of us who study these things to integrate what is happening and keep an open mind.
But not so open that the brain has fallen out.

Using computer models of CO2, no matter how fancy, is nothing more today than an advanced appeal to an authority, one that is also flawed.
I fail to see why CO2 models should enter into a debate about the Sun’s lack of influence. You might as well rail against using models of the Dow Jones Index or the spread of linguistic changes.

Gail, please address the mechanism, not the correlation…..
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
OK I will spell it out. (Remember this is not even conjecture but a SWAG)
#1 The high end wavelengths, UV/E UV part of the sun’s spectrum is more variable than the TSI.
#2 The Solar Wind also changes. (Svenmark and clouds and cosmic rays and such)
#3 Because of Earth’s magnetic field the poles are more likely to see the changes caused by changes in #1 and #2.
# 4 EUV/UV radiation plays a dominant role in heating the thermosphere, Ozone formation and destruction, “storm enhanced densities, tongues of ionization, plasma patches, polar wind jets,” (See Below and the other blurbs I posted)
#5 “..the fact that surface winds [in the Antarctic] have strengthened as the ozone layer has thinned….”
#6. The strength of the the Antarctic Circumpolar Current is dependent on the polar wind in #5.
#7. The formation of the Drakes Passage coincides with the sharp drop in temperature and it is a bottleneck in the Antarctic Circumpolar Current between South America and Antarctica. If the winds change the Antarctic Circumpolar Current changes and you get eddies that will sometimes push cold water further up the coast of South America.

You can see the path of the cold water in this map and in this SST map.

Stronger westerly winds around Antarctica are increasing eddy activity in the Southern Ocean and consequently may be driving more heat southward across the formidable Antarctic Circumpolar Current – the world’s largest current (see map below).

Winds over the Southern Ocean are strengthening due, at least in part, to human-induced change such as ozone depletion and greenhouse gas emissions. Scientists, examining satellite measurements of the ocean surface and using high-resolution computer models, have found that the Antarctic Circumpolar Current only shows a slight acceleration when these winds blow stronger, but that there is a large increase in ocean eddy activity. Eddies are the ocean equivalent of atmospheric weather systems, and in the Southern Ocean they play a key role in moving heat southward toward the Antarctic continent.

More blurbs on Solar EUV and UV and the effects on earth’s atmosphere.

Initial 3-D neutral polar wind
Abstract

The high-latitude polar-cap region is a highly dynamic region with many interesting phenomena associated with it, including the ion and neutral polar winds, plasma patches, polar holes, etc. To elucidate these phenomena and the neutrals produced via charge exchange associated with them, a new 3-D high-latitude hydrodynamic model of the polar-cap region has been developed. The model solves for H+, O+, Hs, Os, and electrons taking into account the effects of precipitating auroral electrons and convection electric fields. The first results of the model show a highly complex system at high-latitudes, with neutral stream particles flowing in all directions due to the combined effects of charge exchange and plasma convection.http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0273117705012184

January, 2013 SSRC HAS BEEN SELECTED BY NASA TO DEVELOP NEXT GENERATION EXTREME-ULTRAVIOLET (EUV) SOLAR RADIOMETERS FOR SPACE WEATHER AND SOLAR PHYSICS APPLICATIONS.

A fundamental requirement for understanding and predicting solar variability and the effects of solar radiation on space weather and Earth climate is the accurate measurement of the radiation emitted by the Sun. While the Sun is brightest in the visible, the fainter and highly variable EUV radiation plays a dominant role in heating the thermosphere, altering the neutral density and electron density, creating the ionosphere…http://www.spacesystemsresearch.com/SSRC-MediaJan2013.html

Recent developments in ionosphere–thermosphere modeling with an emphasis on solar-variability

Abstract

The Utah State University modeling developments have led to new results in several areas of ionospheric research. This review will present the most recent of these results and their synergisms with both ground-based and satellite-based observations. Particular attention is given to new results associated with solar variability, a central theme to the TIGER program. The effect on the ionosphere of differences in solar X-EUV spectra will be demonstrated by studies using the time-dependent ionospheric model, while their effect on the coupled thermosphere–ionosphere system will be shown using a new model, the global average ionosphere thermosphere model. How the dayside solar-produced plasma contributes to sub auroral polarization streams, storm enhanced densities, tongues of ionization, plasma patches, polar wind jets, and polar cap scintillations, will be described via recent modeling results from a variety of coupled or driven thermosphere, ionosphere, and magnetosphere models. The review will indicate the need for improved solar output specification, whether via observations or models. These improvements need to be over the flare through solar cycle time scale, with particular attention to the short wavelength end of the spectrum.http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0273117705012196

INVESTIGATION OVERVIEW
The Solar EUV Experiment (SEE) investigation contributes primarily to the NASA TIMED mission goal to characterize the sources of energy responsible for the thermal structure of the mesosphere, the lower thermosphere, and the ionosphere (MLTI). These energy sources include solar radiation, solar energetic particles, Joule heating, conduction, dynamical forcing, and chemical energy release. Of these energy inputs, the solar vacuum ultraviolet (VUV) radiation below 200 nm is the dominant global energy source for heating of the thermosphere, creating the ionosphere, and driving the diurnal cycles of wind and chemistry. The estimated amount of heating by solar VUV radiation as a function of altitude in Earth’s atmosphere is shown in Figure 1 for solar minimum and solar maximum conditions. Changes in the amount of solar VUV radiation result in corresponding changes in the energy balance of the upper atmosphere, dynamics, and photochemistry. While solar cycle variability near 200 nm is only about 10%, the solar cycle variability at shorter wavelengths is typically a factor of 2 to 3 for chromospheric emissions and a factor of 10 to 100 for coronal emissions. The variability of both of these emissions are not well understood, especially at the shortest wavelengths below 40 nm. A detailed quantitative understanding of the changes in the solar VUV irradiance and the basic state variables, temperature and densities of N 2 , O 2 and O, are essential to detailed investigations of atmospheric energetics, dynamics, and chemistry….

The Sun varies on all time scales and the amount of variability is a strong function of wavelength. Our present understanding is that in the visible portion of the spectrum, the intrinsic solar cycle variability is on the order of one-tenth of a percent. Moving into the middle ultraviolet (200 to 300 nm), the amount of radiation decreases rapidly while the variability increases by an order of magnitude and reaches one to a few percent. Further into the FUV and EUV, the amount of radiation decreases further while the solar cycle variability continues to increase with the magnitude of the variation approaching a factor of two, for example at the H I Lyman-α emission at 121.6 nm, and finally to an order of magnitude variations in the extremely high temperature coronal lines. Solar radiation below 200 nm consists of emission lines superimposed on the rapidly declining continuum. These emission lines arise in higher temperature layers of the outer solar atmosphere under non-LTE conditions and are strongly related to the magnetic activity of the Sun as seen, for example, in plage regions. It is known that these emission lines exhibit large amplitude variability during an 11 year solar cycle while the underlying FUV continuum portion is far less variable11. The XUV region is dominated completely by emission lines, primarily coronal lines which may vary by orders of magnitude during an 11 year solar cycle. Short term variations, lasting from minutes to hours, are related to eruptive phenomena on the Sun; intermediate term variations, modulated by the 27-day rotation period of the Sun, are related to the appearance and disappearance of active regions on the solar disk, and the more elusive long term variability is related to the 22-year magnetic field cycle of the Sun. The long term variation is poorly determined due to the lack of measurements and to the inadequate long term accuracy of previous satellite solar instruments…..
lasp.colorado.edu/see/documents/SEE_Instr_Paper.pdf‎

“One simple fact Republicans understand, but many in the population do not, is that the first year of every presidential term starts with a previous administration’s budget approved by Congress. Republicans began their lying by counting 2009′s fiscal year budget as the President’s even though it began four months before he moved into the White House, and included spending increases of hundreds of billions of dollars in response to Bush-Republicans’ economic and financial catastrophe. ”

Wrong Ed! Congress did not pass a budget for FY 2009 until after the 2008 elections. That budget was passed as soon as the new administration took over In 2009, with a House and Senate controlled by the Democrats. And who signed that budget, Democratic President Obama himself. In fact, Obama was a Senator at the time the budget should have been passed and was part of the effort to delay the budget process until after the election. So it is all on the Democrats and President Obama.

Gail Combs says:
August 13, 2013 at 3:47 pmOK I will spell it out. (Remember this is not even conjecture but a SWAG)
#1 The high end wavelengths, UV/E UV part of the sun’s spectrum is more variable than the TSI.
Since UV/EUV is [but a tiny] part of TSI, its variation is subsumed into that of TSI. If TSI varied by 2 W/m2 the variation of UV/EUV at the same time would be much less than 2 W/m2, something like 0.02 W/m2 or less.

I watched two big horn sheep fight one day a few years back and kept wondering how they could smash their heads together over and over again, how they could not realize with one tremendous head banging that it was much ado about nothing….Lief and Vukcevic, time will tell and truth will out, till then keep on banging I guess, at least it is fun to read!!!

Note there are no sunspot groups in the Northern hemisphere of the sun. The so called solar double peak is caused by the Northern hemisphere and the Southern hemisphere being out of sync. (i.e. The Northern hemisphere is spotless there are still sunspots in the Southern hemisphere.)

There appears to be a pathetic obvious effort to hide the decline in the sunspot number. Wait do not listen to Lief’s pleas that the climate war does not affect sunspot count. Make your own decision. Look at the visual of the sun. Does it agree with the sunspot count? It does not.
It is a fact that the magnetic field strength of newly formed sunspots declines as cycle 24 progresses. A consequence of that fact is the flux tubes that rise up from the tachocline through the turbulent convection zone to form sunspots on the surface of the sun are getting torn apart by the convection forces in the convection zone. The flux tubes require a minimum field strength to survive the turbulent forces in the convection zone. The magnetic field strength of the flux tubes in the Northern hemisphere are below that value. There are hence no sunspot groups in the Northern hemisphere. There is no gradual decline in sunspot groups in the Northern hemisphere, there is an observed cut off.

There are less and less sunspot groups on the surface of the sun. That is a fact. That fact is not reflected in the sunspot count. Solar magnetic cycle 24 is not a normal solar magnetic cycle.

Leif Svalgaard thank you for your time. If you would be so kind to answer 2 questions it would make this solar cycle clearer, 1st has the solar cycle double peaked and 2nd has the magnetic poles reverse.

William Astley says:
August 13, 2013 at 4:51 pmHow many sunspot groups do you see?
Two?
No, at least six.

There appears to be a pathetic obvious effort to hide the decline in the sunspot number.
Nonsense, by whom? Thousands of amateurs the world over watch the sun and count sunspots. Their counts are close to the official count.

Look at the visual of the sun. Does it agree with the sunspot count? It does not.
The latest drawing for Kanzelhohe http://cesar.kso.ac.at/sunspot_drawings/2013/kanz_drawx_fd_20130813_0610.jpg shows seven groups with 71 spots [for yesterday]. That gives a sunspot number of 10*7+71= 141. To convert that to the official scale multiply by 0.6 to yield 85. Kanzelhohe agrees very well with the official count. Are you accusing the Austrian government to collude with me?

Science cannot progress without honesty and integrity.
you can start by showing some of that

William Astley says:
August 13, 2013 at 4:51 pmIt is a fact that the magnetic field strength of newly formed sunspots declines as cycle 24 progresses.
Actually not. Get your ‘facts’ tight. Here is a plot of Bill Livingston’s latest data [received today] http://www.leif.org/research/Livingston%20and%20Penn.png. The field strength has held steady throughout cycle 24 [while being lower than for cycle 23]

Dr Svalgaard, I think you are misinterpreting the word “peaked” as used in these comments. IMHO, they are referring to the monthly smoothed sunspot number and not an intermediate high of spots that cycle 14 showed on a number of occasions after the flip. I believe they are asking if a new high in the smoothed number has a possibility of occurring in this cycle.

The warmists lack a game plan. They need to start looking for a way out. This is setting up to be a significant election issue. Global cooling is going to be a game changer. After years of parrot repeating. The science is settled. The science is settled. The planet cools. What do you think the public reaction will be?

The planet has started to cool due to the solar cycle 24 changes. That cooling is going to accelerate and is going to be significant.

righttimewrongplace says:
August 13, 2013 at 6:06 pmI think you are misinterpreting the word “peaked” as used in these comments. IMHO, they are referring to the monthly smoothed sunspot number
The smoothed sunspot number [black curve] http://www.leif.org/research/SC14-and-24.png also shows multiple peaks in cycle 14 [I count about 4 of them] and so might also cycle 24. The ‘double peak’ is an unfortunate oversimplification by Dean Pesnell at NASA. Now, interpreted generously he might have been thinking of a hemispheric asymmetry shown by many solar cycles as we show in this paper: http://www.leif.org/research/ApJ88587.pdf Figure 7 compares cycles 14 and 24. It is quite possible that there will a similar asymmetry in cycle 24, perhaps changing over more than twice, as in the cycle peaking in 1980.

William Astley says:
August 13, 2013 at 6:13 pmThe climate change war most definitely is affecting sunspot group count.
Unfounded nonsense.Does anyone see seven (7) sunspot groups? Does 2 + 2 = 5? This is ridiculous, pathetic.https://wattsupwiththat.com/reference-pages/solar/
It is just a fact. Live with it. Kanzelhohe yesterday saw 7 groups. In a few hours you can check their drawing for 8-14 here: http://cesar.kso.ac.at/sunspot_drawings/2013/ where you can also look at any other day in 2013. If you go back a directory you can see the drawings all the way back to 1944. Solar activity was important to the German Air Force, Luftwaffe, so they funded the observatory.
You can also count the groups in other wavelengths, e.g. http://sdowww.lmsal.com/suntoday/
or here: http://www.solarmonitor.org/ I count seven groups in any and all wavelengths including the visible.

I think the important lesson of history is that science doesn’t currently know for a fact whether Grand Solar Minima will cause devastating global cooling, which is a travesty.

Had climatology NOT been hijacked by the IPCC for the CAGW scam in the 1980’s, REAL science would have been free to pursue REAL experiments on REAL hypotheses, which could have led to REAL discoveries of how our climate actually works.

William Astley says:
August 13, 2013 at 4:51 pmThere is no gradual decline in sunspot groups in the Northern hemisphere, there is an observed cut off.
More nonsense/ Here you can the whole solar surface. http://stereo-ssc.nascom.nasa.gov/beacon/beacon_secchi.shtml there are active regions in the Northern Hemisphere, they just happen to be on the backside of the Sun for the moment.

William Astley says:
August 13, 2013 at 6:47 pmThe magnetic field strength of newly formed sunspots continues to decline. As noted above as there are no sunspots with a magnetic field strength less than 1500 Gauss the graph flattens out.
There has never been sunspots below 1500 Gauss and the mean value of newly formed [since spots on average only live a couple of days almost all of them are ‘newly formed’] sunspots has been rather steady about 2060 Gauss throughout cycle 24, only varying +/-20 Gauss.

This is pathetic.Do the warmists think they can hide a spotless sun?
It is pathetic that you claim the sun is spotless when it is not.

If there is a change in government there needs to be significant house keeping.
Most sunspot counting is not done or controlled by the US government, so whatever you propose will have no effect.

William Astley says:
August 13, 2013 at 6:47 pm
The magnetic field strength of newly formed sunspots continues to decline. As noted above as there are no sunspots with a magnetic field strength less than 1500 Gauss the graph flattens out.
There has never been sunspots below 1500 Gauss and the mean value of newly formed [since spots on average only live a couple of days almost all of them are ‘newly formed’] sunspots has been rather steady about 2060 Gauss throughout cycle 24, only varying +/-20 Gauss.
William:This is pathetic.Do the warmists think they can hide a spotless sun?

Lief: It is pathetic that you claim the sun is spotless when it is not.
William: The EOS paper July 28, 2009 states the obvious. The sun will be spotless in 2015. Sometime between now and then the sun will be spotless. I suppose that might be political inconvenient.

I did not say the sun is spotless now. You and I both know that. If and when the sun is spotless it will not be possible to hide that fact. My point is it does not make sense to monkey with the sunspot count as it only makes it more difficult to explain the spotless sun and the cooling planet. Propaganda does not change reality.

https://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/08/15/livingston-and-penn-in-eos-are-sunspots-different-during-this-solar-minimum/
Are Sunspots Different During This Solar Minimum?
EOS, TRANSACTIONS, AMERICAN GEOPHYSICAL UNION VOLUME 90 NUMBER 3, 28 JULY 2009
The same data were later published [Penn and Livingston, 2006], and the observations showed that the magnetic field strength in sunspots were decreasing with time, independent of the sunspot cycle. A simple linear extrapolation of those data suggested that sunspots might completely vanish by 2015
William: If there is a change in government there needs to be significant housekeeping.

Leif: Most sunspot counting is not done or controlled by the US government, so whatever you propose will have no effect.
William: Give me a break and I suppose the IPCC is an independent scientific body. Trillions of dollars have been wasted on green scams and the planet cools. Do you think there will be a back lash

Mario Lento says:
August 13, 2013 at 7:22 pmCan anyone explain to me why the x-axis on all of the July 2013 solar graphs, show what appears to be 20 days of “Jan” January data?
I don’t think they are. Look again.

Irregardless of the great bun fight about the roll of the sun between Lief and Vuc et al, solar scientists have to come to terms with why a quite sun corresponds to cold periods in our past.

The sun is our only source of heat both in the rays we see and its invisible tentacles that stir our core and give us our protective magnet. That some thing changes that varies our climatic conditions is beyond doubt, or our climate would be stable forever. It is time for our solar scientists to think outside the square, for all is not as it seems.

I have no expertise in these matters as a lowly engineer but I tend to correlate many diverse things that seem connected, the ebb and flow of human history is directly related to climate changes, both the good and the bad times in our history are keys to climate.

Looking for what was different in the sun and solar and celestial mechanics may give a better idea of what our future holds, it is not us that controls our climate and those that think we do, have much to learn.

For much of the last century and all of this one has seen main stream science close the door to any one thinking out side the square, and not just climate science. The time has come to tear the doors open and let in a bit of light.

Leif: Leif Svalgaard says:
August 13, 2013 at 7:33 pm
Mario Lento says:
August 13, 2013 at 7:22 pm
Can anyone explain to me why the x-axis on all of the July 2013 solar graphs, show what appears to be 20 days of “Jan” January data?
I don’t think they are. Look again.
++++++
Thank you. I just refreshed my page, and still the .gif image shows clearly, Jan 00…. Jan19 on the x axis of all graphs for me.

wayne Job says:
August 13, 2013 at 7:34 pmsolar scientists have to come to terms with why a quite sun corresponds to cold periods in our past.
Except they don’t so what is there to come to terms about?. See slide 20 of http://www.leif.org/research/Does%20The%20Sun%20Vary%20Enough.pdf
Climate arm-chair ‘experts’ need to come to terms with why there is no correspondence.

Leif: Actually it’s Jan-00, to Jan-19 on the first and second graph. The 3rd graph shows only through the 14th of Jan. The graphs are updated as of Aug 5th just below the x-axis on the .gif images of each graph.

Mario Lento says:
August 13, 2013 at 7:36 pmThank you. I just refreshed my page, and still the .gif image shows clearly, Jan 00…. Jan19 on the x axis of all graphs for me.
Sorry I misunderstood what you meant, probably because that is the graph is supposed to look like. Jan 2013 is plotted on the line labeled 13. What is wrong with that?

Mario Lento says:
August 13, 2013 at 7:39 pm
The 3rd graph shows only through the 14th of Jan.
and what is wrong with that? The last point plotted is for July 2013. That the graph does extend to Jan-19 is probably because there is no ‘official’ forecast for Ap.
[]
Ah, perhaps you are further out of the reservation than I thought.
[]
What is plotted are not for days of January. So not for the fourteenth of January, but for then month of January in the year of 2014. and the point marked 01 is not for the 1st of January. but for January of 2001.

And of the ionosphere even below the exosphere. But those are not involved in climate apart from possibly being influenced a bit by upward travelling waves from the troposphere.

All you have to do is to examine the temperature variations all the way down to around 70,000 feet (the Aqua data sets) over a scale of years and you will see that atmospheric temperatures are affected by solar variances in ultraviolet. How exactly do you know beyond any shadow of a doubt that these atmospheric density factors do not influence climate? Nocculucent clouds and their appearance are at these altitudes and those have a significant effect on the total radiation received by the Earth on the ground.

There is also vertical lightning, that was not even known about in detail until 1989 and these electrical connections between the ionosphere and the troposphere have barely been investigated, even though tens of terawatts of energy is exchanged in these bursts, all the way into the gamma spectrum. How are these bursts effected by changing atmospheric density? By ionospheric charging? Come on, you know as well as I that these questions have barely been asked, much less studied and answered.

You keep saying that these are all minor contributors but it is clear from the paleo climate record that the climate of the Earth has been dramatically shaped by many minor contributors. Hell the energy balance equations say that the eccentricity term should not be dominating the glacial cycles yet, it does.

There are many coupling factors between what we in the community have always laughingly called the ignorosphere (below the satellites and above balloons), thus to make blanket statements about solar/terrestrial connections seems to be more hubris than science.

Leif Svalgaard says:
August 13, 2013 at 7:42 pm
Mario Lento says:
August 13, 2013 at 7:36 pm
Thank you. I just refreshed my page, and still the .gif image shows clearly, Jan 00…. Jan19 on the x axis of all graphs for me.
Sorry I misunderstood what you meant, probably because that is the graph is supposed to look like. Jan 2013 is plotted on the line labeled 13. What is wrong with that?
+++++++
Thank you for your patience with me.
OK – yes, of course… I am calibrated now… I just counted the 7 data points for July, 2013 –and un-confused myself. :)

denniswingo says:
August 13, 2013 at 7:48 pmHow exactly do you know beyond any shadow of a doubt that these atmospheric density factors do not influence climate?
The shoe is on the other foot. There is no good evidence that they do.

but it is clear from the paleo climate record that the climate of the Earth has been dramatically shaped by many minor contributors. Hell the energy balance equations say that the eccentricity term should not be dominating the glacial cycles yet, it does.
The eccentricity term has a great influence on glacial cycles because the variation in insolation is great.

thus to make blanket statements about solar/terrestrial connections seems to be more hubris than science.
you mean: such as to say that obviously the Sun is the major driver?
My point is that looking at the data I am unimpressed and I have looked hard and long. But as I said: present what you think is the BEST evidence that solar activity is the major driver of climate and we can dissect that. It is clear that there is SOME influence on the 0.1C level, so that does not need be discussed.

denniswingo says:
August 13, 2013 at 7:48 pmThere is also vertical lightning, that was not even known about in detail until 1989 and these electrical connections between the ionosphere and the troposphere have barely been investigated, even though tens of terawatts of energy is exchanged in these bursts, all the way into the gamma spectrum.
The direction of energy is upwards. There is not enough energy up there to affect anything below. The solar activity [auroral and solar wind] input over the entire globe is a thousand times less than your tens of terawatts.

Gail, your comment was a mish mashed soup of correlations. Once again, please focus on mechanism. Ozone depletion may indeed be correlated with changes in wind patterns and amount of water volume pouring through Drakes Passage. But which is driving which and how? You seem to be grasping for a great many straws and hope the answer is somewhere in the soup.

Ages ago, my thesis advisor gave me a great deal of grief getting me to narrow my research focus. Hell, at one point I thought the man wanted me to measure the difference between the size of turds coming out of a gnat’s ass. Turns out the man knew what he was talking about. Narrow your focus and tell me what you think the mechanism is. Fish through the soup and find the bay leaf. I want to know what your bay leaf is telling you.

Pamela Gray says:
August 13, 2013 at 8:11 pmGail, your comment was a mish mashed soup of correlations. Once again, please focus on mechanism.
Pamela, that is a common strategy [also to pepper it with bold and italics and capital letters] designed to overwhelm you and make it impossible to formulate a reply. It is used by many at WUWT and is akin to raising your voice. As the old maxim goes: ‘if your argument is weak, raise your voice; if it is wrong, SHOUT’

William Astley says:
August 13, 2013 at 7:15 pmLief: It is pathetic that you claim the sun is spotless when it is not.
William: The EOS paper July 28, 2009 states the obvious. The sun will be spotless in 2015.
If you overlay their old graph [that you keep referring to although it is outdated] with what the Sun has actually been doing since, you may see that their old prediction did not come to pass: http://www.leif.org/research/Livingston-Penn-Then-and-Now.png

My point is it does not make sense to monkey with the sunspot count as it only makes it more difficult to explain the spotless sun and the cooling planet. Propaganda does not change reality.
Nobody is monkeying with the sunspot count. Thousands of amateurs all over the world are your guarantee for that.

Speaking of solar, an update from Western Australia where climate change is affecting the broader population …

The WA government introduced an absurd climate change prevention subsidy a few years ago so people who installed solar panels were given a contract whereby they could sell back their excess power into the grid at a set price for 10 years.

Research shows mostly middle and high income earners thought it was a great idea to instal solar panels that increased the capital value of their homes, provided mostly free electricity for the rest of their lives and earned them extra money when the sun shines – and about 78,000 households took up the offer.

With the WA economy now in a dive, the government announced in its annual Budget last week that the solar feed-in tariff would be cut from 40 to 20 cents, sparking outrage within the media and among the lucky rich who had enough money to quickly threaten legal action against the government for breach of contract. The government caved in a couple of days ago and reinstated the 40 cent payment so taxpayers and other consumers are now forced to hand over close to half a billion dollars in the next decade to mostly rich people who enjoy mostly free electricity. That’s a few hospitals and schools we presumably won’t need. The government insists it’s legally entitled to reduce the tariff (which I personally think they should have scrapped entirely) so its backdown is purely from political pressure. The crazy thing is that many people are in fact willing to each hand over thousands of dollars to the free electricity, rich solar schemers in coming years because the government would otherwise break its word so it’s the ethical thing to do.

A big problem, of course, is the “mostly”. That means that when the sun don’t shine, the 78,000 properties are reliant on the base grid to ensure their lights, air conditioning and plasma TVs are working 24 hours every day. They still enjoy that security but don’t have to contribute anything towards an ageing power grid comprising a giant network of wooden poles that costs a fortune to repair and maintain. That means the power companies have only one choice, which is to increase electricity prices for the 800,000 other households including poor people and tenants who can barely afford a single bar heater, let alone a solar panel. The companies either charge more, are government subsidised by other taxpayers, or go broke and the evil, fossil-fueled power grid stops working.

Power prices have been going through the roof over recent years in WA, which probably has more underground fossil energy per capita than any other jurisdiction on earth, and we’ll have to pay thousands of dollars extra in coming years to subsidise the wealthy whose greed is camouflaged by the crackpot morality that they’re saving our grandkids from climate change.

Yet another example of how AGW is indeed affecting people, particularly the poor who fall ill or die because they can’t afford adequate heating or cooling that is priced to subsidise renewable power sources.

Ben Darren Hillicoss says:
August 13, 2013 at 4:47 pmhow they could not realize with one tremendous head banging that it was much ado about nothing….
Because it is not much ado by nothing. Solar cycle prediction is of great importance. Lives and billions of dollars depend on correct predictions.

WACLIMATE: Could you provide the source of 50million per year in cost to tax payers in WA? If this is true, I would like to be able to use this fact in an argument. Wow – that’s quite a hefty loss for tax payers in one state if true.

Leif Svalgaard says:
August 13, 2013 at 3:33 pm
…………………….
You are again distorting what is clearly shown, if you look at the two time scaleshttp://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/PF.htm
On the graph is compared existing record from the early1800’s and what might (or not ) happen in late 2020’s.
Two theoretical works confirm my findings,http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/LFC17.htm
you may not like it but you can go and reproduce formulae from

I did happen across one that was updated (late 2012) at some point but either did not bookmark it or it is in the lost bookmark collection that I know exists but never can find.
I ‘think’ I also read an article in 2009 with an older graphic (iffn I’m recollectin correctly)

Having read this article, and agreed with the premise even though I am an amature, the current low solar max is not a suprise to me. Perhaps I should be suprised. The science they are doing I take at face value, that may be an error.

I do get a kick out of the NASA predictions being wrong and re-predicted lower more than once.

It’s almost as much fun as watching Leif get tag teamed. The predictions of him showing up are rarely incorrect.

We do live in interesting times. People in power are watching what we do.

Leif Svalgaard says:
August 13, 2013 at 8:56 pm
William Astley says:
August 13, 2013 at 7:15 pm
Lief: It is pathetic that you claim the sun is spotless when it is not.
William: The EOS paper July 28, 2009 states the obvious. The sun will be spotless in 2015.
If you overlay their old graph [that you keep referring to although it is outdated] with what the Sun has actually been doing since, you may see that their old prediction did not come to pass: http://www.leif.org/research/Livingston-Penn-Then-and-Now.png

William:
Let’s have some fun with this issue, I am sure there are mathematical types in the forum who will understand the issue and its nuances. There is however as noted at the end of this comment no need to die on this hill as the key variable is planetary temperature change not smoothed sunspot group count in terms of the climate change issue.

Livingston and Penn’s observational analysis showed that the magnetic field strength of newly formed sunspots has been decaying at 46 gauss/year 1992 to 2010. It is to be expected due to physical constraints on the minimum magnetic field strength required for a sunspot to be visible and for mathematical (sampling reasons ) that when the magnetic field strength of some of the sunspots drops below around 1800 Gauss the slope of the data will flatten out.

Prior to around 2010 the 46 Gauss/year decay in the magnetic field strength of newly formed sunspots did not affect the number of sunspots observed on the surface of the sun. Around 2010 however the magnetic field strength of some of the newly formed sunspots is less 1500 Gauss to 1800 Gauss and they are no longer visible which biases and changes the mathematical structure of the data set.

The physically reason and mathematical reason therefore for the observation that the ‘curve’ flattens out, is that when the magnetic field strength of a newly formed sunspot drops below 1800 Gauss (actually a range of 1500 Gauss to 1800 Gauss) the sunspot in question is no longer observable and drops out of the data set. That fact explains why the slope of the data flattens out. The magnetic field strength of the newly formed sunspots therefore can still be declining at 46 gauss per year, when the spots start to drop out of the data set the curve of the data becomes biased which flattens the curve out.

It is interesting that prior to around 2010 the linear decay in the magnetic field of newly formed sunspots does not affect the number of observed sunspot/sun spot groups on the surface of the sun based on the assumptions. Prior to 2010 therefore the curve of solar cycle 24 should not have been affected. Post 2010 there should however start to be an anomalous drop in the smooth sunspot count curve if the counting scheme used to count sunspot groups and sunspot is constant, not changed. As I do not see any change in the smoothed sunspot count curve post 2010 (comparing solar cycle 24 to other solar cycles) and as I have been duly fully watching the observations and data daily for the last 15 years and believe I have noticed a change in the sunspot group counting scheme particularly in the last 18 months, I assumed there must be a physical reason for that anomaly and what appears to be a sunspot group counting scheme change. Of course I could incorrect the there may be no change in the sunspot group counting scheme and as Leif notes there are a large number of amateur groups that are interested in solar observation, so a change in the sunspot group counting scheme might be noticed.

However, it should be noted, that the smoothed sunspot group count does matter in the scheme of the climate wars. Few people are aware changes in the solar magnetic cycle have in the past correlated with significant climate change and most people do not know what a Dansgaard-Oeschger cycle is. The key variable that affects the climate wars is planetary temperature change.

How much and how rapid the Arctic cools and how rapid the Arctic sea recovers, and how quickly global temperature drops will likely be a key catalyst to change the climate change discussions from both a scientific standpoint and from policy standpoint. (Also sever cold winters, frost damage to crops, and so on will bring media and public attention to the cooling.) If and when the planet starts to unequivocally cool politicians, media, and the public will be asking scientist to explain how significant rapid cooling is possible. What has changed to explain the sudden significant cooling? i.e. A plateau of no warming can be explained by heat hiding in the ocean or can be de-emphasized by changing temperature data. Cooling is a more serious issue for the warmists to explain. It is not physically possible in a democracy with a free press to hide cooling.

Leif,
I am asking if any forecast of Las Cruces is standing up. At the press conference, held at the annual meeting of the Solar Physics Division of the American Astronomical Society in Las Cruces (June 14, 2011), New Mexico, three scientists gave a forecast of sorts for the next solar cycle, number 25.
1. Hill and colleagues reported on a jet-stream-like flow within the sun that they have been monitoring since 1995 using “helioseismology,” the study of sun-wide oscillations of the solar surface.
What are the implications for the development of Cycle 25 from the latest results based on their global helioseismic observations from GONG and MDI, with recent results from HMI?
2. “Around the peak of a solar cycle, the magnetic field at the sun’s poles reverses direction, with the old field erased by the new, oppositely directed field. But the current delayed cycle may not be strong enough to fully erase the old field. The findings suggest that this cycle’s solar maximum, predicted to occur in 2013, may be weak or not occur at all, Altrock says.” (http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/331320/description/Next_solar_cycle_could_be_a_no-show__) Meanwhile, the solar polar fields have begun their reversal.
Does it implicate that Altrock’s assumptions have now become obsolete?
3. Penn and Livingston found that the typical field strength of spots began declining in the past cycle. Now we see that the field strength does not continue to decline in this cycle.
Does it mean that the next cycle will have sunspots at solar maximum (while no spots at all were predicted)?

William Astley says:
August 14, 2013 at 1:32 amThe physically reason and mathematical reason therefore for the observation that the ‘curve’ flattens out, is that when the magnetic field strength of a newly formed sunspot drops below 1800 Gauss (actually a range of 1500 Gauss to 1800 Gauss) the sunspot in question is no longer observable and drops out of the data set.
It is not that the spot is no longer visible. It is not formed in the first place. But as you can see, there is no sign that the sun will be spotless any time soon, and certainly not by 2015, or 2014, or 2013 [as you said earlier]. Perhaps in about 10-20 years time the sunspot number will have reached Maunder Minimum levels, but the ‘solar magnetic cycle’ will not have gone away, cosmic rays will still be modulated, we will still have a solar wind, etc.

I believe I have noticed a change in the sunspot group counting scheme particularly in the last 18 months, I assumed there must be a physical reason for that anomaly and what appears to be a sunspot group counting scheme change.
There has been no change of the sunspot counting method. The change is in the Sun: although the magnetic field is there it has not concentrated into a spot and is hence not counted and the sunspot number is reduced. TSI and the number of CMEs are not reduced, it is only the number of spots that is smaller than we would expect from the other indicators of solar activity. We are not doing it, the Sun is doing it to us. This is not to say that small changes [say of the order of 10%] in the sunspot counting can not have occurred. E.g. if Sergio Cortesi at Locarno is slowly going blind that will drag the sunspot number down, but such will soon be detected and corrected. As you realized there are many people watching the Sun.

However, it should be noted, that the smoothed sunspot group count does matter in the scheme of the climate wars.
Only if you believe that the Sun is a major driver of the climate.

Few people are aware changes in the solar magnetic cycle have in the past correlated with significant climate change and most people do not know what a Dansgaard-Oeschger cycle is.
The OD-cycles are not caused by the Sun in the first place, so what does it matter that ‘few people are aware’.

If and when the planet starts to unequivocally cool politicians, media, and the public will be asking scientist to explain how significant rapid cooling is possible.
The climate warms and cools all the time, e.g. there was cooling from the 1940s even though solar activity was increasing. People were yammering [as they are beginning to do now] about a looming ice age. The Sun was not the reason back then and is not the reason now.

What has changed to explain the sudden significant cooling
There is no sudden, significant cooling

It is not physically possible in a democracy with a free press to hide cooling.
Nor warming for that matter. One might doubt that we have a democracy with a free press, but that is another issue.

rikgheysens says:
August 14, 2013 at 2:12 am1. Hill and colleagues reported on a jet-stream-like flow within the sun that they have been monitoring since 1995 using “helioseismology,” the study of sun-wide oscillations of the solar surface. What are the implications for the development of Cycle 25 from the latest results based on their global helioseismic observations from GONG and MDI, with recent results from HMI?
The ‘missing’ signs of the new cycle have been found after all, so there will be a cycle 25.

2. “Around the peak of a solar cycle, the magnetic field at the sun’s poles reverses direction, with the old field erased by the new, oppositely directed field. But the current delayed cycle may not be strong enough to fully erase the old field. … Meanwhile, the solar polar fields have begun their reversal.
Does it implicate that Altrock’s assumptions have now become obsolete?
It means that one should be careful about extrapolating based on only a few years of data. Altrock’s newest data shows a return to the usual behavior.

3. Penn and Livingston found that the typical field strength of spots began declining in the past cycle. Now we see that the field strength does not continue to decline in this cycle.
Does it mean that the next cycle will have sunspots at solar maximum (while no spots at all were predicted)?
As explained above the ‘flattening’ of decline is a consequence of the bottom of the distribution being cut off. So there will be sunspot in the next cycle, but fewer than expected compared to the overall magnetic flux on the Sun. Of course, all of this is speculation at this point, but if true, we’ll probably figure out what causes Grand Minima, so an exciting time it will be.

vukcevic says:
August 14, 2013 at 12:20 amOn the graph is compared existing record from the early 1800’s and what might (or not) happen in late 2020’s.
Oh no, you claimed that the red curve would show what happened in the 1800s, that there were two reversals near 1810 [two years apart] but that cloudy weather and muddy battlefields prevented observations of the solar cycle maxima in 1809 and 1811.

Two theoretical works confirm my findings
You will find it requires 90 degrees switch at around 1800 (Sin instead Cos).
Which just shows how wrong the formula is.

There you go again, implying what is not there, look at it and read, the bottom graphhttp://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/PF.htm
shows clearly comparison of extrapolated equation for the 2020s evolution of the polar fields and the monthly sunspot records (SIDC) at the time of Dalton minimum and no more and no less.
Equation was produced in the early 2003, more than 10 years ago (as marked with the red arrow) and has up to now proved remarkably correct, you may not like it but you have to bear it, until it goes wrong. Just remember what your colleagues at NASA were talking about in 2003-4,
What happened in 1800 I don’t know, equally I don’t know what might happen in the 2020s, apparently you do, so you are welcome to go on about it till cows come home, but you will have to be patient and wait to see what happens to be certain.
I’m sure you’ll have more fun elsewhere, than trashing this equation for last 4-5 years and getting nowhere.
Have fun, I got better and more important things to do.

Gail, your comment was a mish mashed soup of correlations. Once again, please focus on mechanism. Ozone depletion may indeed be correlated with changes in wind patterns and amount of water volume pouring through Drakes Passage. But which is driving which and how? You seem to be grasping for a great many straws and hope the answer is somewhere in the soup.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>..
Pam, I said it was conjecture, that is an intriguing line of correlations. For what it’s worth, I was so good at putting together miscellaneous pieces of information and solving problems at my division, that a VP at a well know fortune 500 company would ship me off to other factories to solve the problems when everyone else failed. At another company they though there was a high level information leak, again because I ‘correlated’ my observations and figured out the plant was going to be shut down in a year. I am not surprised you and Dr.S can not follow my thoughts, not many people could over my forty years in industry even though I thought the connections were glaringly obvious.

The papers I linked show the sun varies mostly in the UV and shorter wavelengths, UV variation effects ozone formation and destruction as well as the heating of the ionosphere. The amount of ozone has been shown to effect the polar jets. The polar jet strength (winds) effects the Antarctic Circumpolar Current and causes eddies. The eddies cause more cold water to shoot up the coast of South America helping to feed La Nina conditions. More La Nina’s are seen during the cooling cycle of the PDO. Bob Tisdale has shown ENSO has a major effect on SST which in turn effects the earth’s climate as a whole.

Then there is the sun’s direct influence on the pacific ocean:

A correlation of mean period of MJO indices and 11-yr solar variation
We analyze the long-term evolution of seasonal temperature disturbances in a 2.5×2.5° area of the US North Pacific. Late Fall and early Winter display significant correlation of temperature disturbances and are investigated in detail. The long-term evolution of the Fall temperature disturbances from 1945 to 2008 closely follows that of solar activity. The robustness of these results is successfully controlled in a 2.5×2.5° area immediately north of the studied region. The modulation of temperature disturbances is very large (∼30%) compared to the corresponding changes in solar irradiance, and has significant variability, even at small geographical scale. The physical mechanism of solar forcing of temperature disturbances remains to be understood, but a relation with cloudiness and influence of the Madden–Julian oscillation in the North Pacific is suggested.…http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1364682612000302

I am not for one minute suggesting variations in UV and ONLY variations in UV control the climate. If that was true we wouldn’t need this comment in the first place because it would be glaringly obvious. However UV/solar variation is one of the major factors IMHO and this post was about the sun.

Another possible factor is lunar tides and lunar/sun tides a much more complicated mess then the ordinary person would think.

Jo Nova has a discussion of a new paper about the lunar influence on ENSO link

And there is another paper discussing the lunar influence on the Dansgaard-Oeschger/ Bond events. NOAA plainly states they just don’t know what causes these major climate events. “…The cause of these glacial events is still under debate. Currently, the leading hypothesis involves a slowdown of the ocean’s thermohaline circulation. During the last glacial time, large ice sheets rimmed the North Atlantic (Figure 2). At certain times, these ice sheets released large amounts of freshwater into the North Atlantic…. The initial trigger for freshwater releases has not yet been identified. One suggestion is that small, gradual changes in solar output could have influenced the timing of abrupt changes (Bond et al., 2001). Other ideas call upon natural oscillations of the ice sheets themselves (MacAyeal, 1993; Hulbe et al., 2004; Alley et al., 2006) or of ocean processes (Shaffer et al., 2004, Flückiger et al., 2006).…”

Variations in solar irradiance are widely believed to explain climatic change on 20,000- to 100,000-year time-scales in accordance with the Milankovitch theory of the ice ages, but there is no conclusive evidence that variable irradiance can be the cause of abrupt fluctuations in climate on time-scales as short as 1,000 years. We propose that such abrupt millennial changes, seen in ice and sedimentary core records, were produced in part by well characterized, almost periodic variations in the strength of the global oceanic tide-raising forces caused by resonances in the periodic motions of the earth and moon. A well defined 1,800-year tidal cycle is associated with gradually shifting lunar declination from one episode of maximum tidal forcing on the centennial time-scale to the next. An amplitude modulation of this cycle occurs with an average period of about 5,000 years, associated with gradually shifting separation-intervals between perihelion and syzygy at maxima of the 1,800-year cycle. We propose that strong tidal forcing causes cooling at the sea surface by increasing vertical mixing in the oceans. On the millennial time-scale, this tidal hypothesis is supported by findings, from sedimentary records of ice-rafting debris, that ocean waters cooled close to the times predicted for strong tidal forcing.

….We propose that variations in the strength of oceanic tides cause periodic cooling of surface ocean water by modulating the intensity of vertical mixing that brings to the surface colder water from below. The tides provide more than half of the total power for vertical mixing, 3.5 terawatts (4), compared with about 2.0 terawatts from wind drag (3), making this hypothesis plausible. Moreover, the tidal mixing process is strongly nonlinear, so that vertical mixing caused by tidal forcing must vary in intensity interannually even though the annual rate of power generation is constant (3). As a consequence, periodicities in strong forcing, that we will now characterize by identifying the peak forcing events of sequences of strong tides, may so strongly modulate vertical mixing and sea-surface temperature as to explain cyclical cooling even on the millennial time-scale.…

vukcevic says:
August 14, 2013 at 5:40 amshows clearly comparison of extrapolated equation for the 2020s evolution of the polar fields and the monthly sunspot records (SIDC) at the time of Dalton minimum and no more and no less.
If the equation is correct then it should show the PF for the 1800s as well and it does not, so no need to invoke the 2020s. It makes no sense to compare the observations of the 1800s with the formula output for the 2020s. You should compare the formula output for the 1800s with the observations for 1800s. And they don’t match at all. Ah, perhaps as you say it would be better to use SIN instead of COS for that time, or for the 2020s as well. or for the 1900s where you also have a problem. Just goes to show how wrong the formula is. You see we do not have to wait, the formula should be valid at all times and we have 300 years of data to test it on, and it fails.

You evade the issue of 2-yr long solar cycles and have not commented on your belief that solar cycle 4a was only three years long.

I got better and more important things to do
You say that often, and yet you return time and time again to the addiction of WUWT.

Leif Svalgaard says:
August 14, 2013 at 4:36 am
….
Oh, yes, you were talking earlier and again out of your hat about lost cycle and my formula
Here it ishttp://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/SC4a.htm
look and learn!

vukcevic says:
August 14, 2013 at 5:57 amHere it is http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/SC4a.htm look and learn!
First of all cycle 4a has been discredtied more than a decade ago and nobody accepts that any more. Second, Usoskin sais that 4a was 7 years long, incompatible with you. Third, your ‘SS’ formula is different from your PF formula and ‘predicts’ different max and mins: http://www.leif.org/research/Vuk-Failing-17.png and BTW doesn’t look like the actual SSN anyway. You artificially invoke a ‘phase change’ 1770-1810 to make things fit the non-existent cycle 4a. Perhaps you need phase changes also around 1875 and 2000. All of this is the purest numerology with no scientific content, but as you say is meant as ‘entertainment only’ or was it ‘Joe Blogs fun trip into gaga land’

…Cooling is a more serious issue for the warmists to explain. It is not physically possible in a democracy with a free press to hide cooling…..
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
I agree that cooling is the more serious issue but I hate to tell you we do not have a ‘Free Press’ We have a bought and paid for press. (see my comment at this link )

The most recent example of the ‘Free Press’ lying through their teeth to hoodwink the public is this:

Climate Change Is Threatening the Power Grid
Just days away from the 10-year anniversary of the worst power outage in U.S. history, the White House and the Energy Department released a report on Monday evaluating the resiliency of the nation’s electric grid and recommending steps to prevent future blackouts. full story

So what about the “Green Energy companies funded with tax payer dollars that are supposed to replace these coal fired plants? They are going bankrupt at an alarming rate So far, [thats] 34 companies OOPS, I guess the government miscalculated.

“Letting non-professionals get involved in the power grid is like giving the keys to the family car and a bottle of whiskey to a 14 year old boy and his pals. If the renewables were viable, we’d adopt them by the train-load and build them so fast your head would spin.”

What the politicians neglect to say is their plan for making this work is to install Smart Meters, an attractive opportunity for Investors This theoretically allows residential electricity to be turned off so the system can be balanced as wind and solar power surges and declines. Of course with renewables bankrupting, smart meters not installed and coal plants closing at three time the rate expected, this put a real big kink in that plan. OOPS, I guess the government miscalculated AGAIN so we are looking at rolling blackouts.

… With smart meters, CenterPoint Energy is proposing to add a process prior to shutting down whole circuits to conduct a mass turn off of individual meters with 200 amps or less (i.e. residential and small commercial consumers) for 15 or 30 minutes, rotating consumers impacted during that outage as well as possible future outages.

There are several benefits to consumers of this proposed process. By isolating non-critical service accounts (“critical” accounts include hospitals, police stations, water treatment facilities etc.) and spreading “load shed” to a wider distribution, critical accounts that happen to share the same circuit with non-critical accounts will be less affected in the event of an emergency. Curtailment of other important public safety devices and services such as traffic signals, police and fire stations, and water pumps and sewer lifts may also be avoided.

And the Department of Energy Report that show Obama’s Administration has had this planned since he took office.

The Department of Energy Report 2009
A smart grid is needed at the distribution level to manage voltage levels, reactive power, potential reverse power flows, and power conditioning, all critical to running grid-connected DG systems, particularly with high penetrations of solar and wind power and PHEVs…. Designing and retrofitting household appliances, such as washers, dryers, and water heaters with technology to communicate and respond to market signals and user preferences via home automation technology will be a significant challenge. Substantial investment will be required….

These controls and tools could reduce the occurrence of outages and power disturbances attributed to grid overload. They could also reduce planned rolling brownouts and blackouts like those implemented during the energy crisis in California in 2000.

Gail Combs says:
August 14, 2013 at 5:48 amI am not surprised you and Dr.S can not follow my thoughts, not many people could over my forty years in industry even though I thought the connections were glaringly obvious.
This shows your failure to communicate effectively. Oneself is the poorest judge of such things. If your audience does not get it, it is your fault, not theirs.

Perhaps you were sloppy and forget to add pi/3 in just the right place:
That makes the overall fit somewhat better, but you are still in trouble, e.g. around 1900. Perhaps you need to flip the phase in many places to make things come out right. Maybe a ‘flip-function’ or perhaps a ‘flop-function’ should be seriously considered. Such a function can be constructed to ensure perfect agreement all the time and is perhaps worth your time to search for.

What has changed to explain the sudden significant cooling – William AstleyThere is no sudden, significant cooling – Leif Svalgaard
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
HMMMMmmmm, That is not what the geologists tell us.

Richard B. Alley of the U.Penn. chaired the National Research Council on Abrupt Climate Change.

“…Recent scientific evidence shows that major and widespread climate changes have occurred with startling speed. For example, roughly half the north Atlantic warming since the last ice age was achieved in only a decade, and it was accompanied by significant climatic changes across most of the globe. Similar events, including local warmings as large as 16°C, occurred repeatedly during the slide into and climb out of the last ice age….

…climate models typically underestimate the size, speed, and extent of those changes. Hence, future abrupt changes cannot be predicted with confidence, and climate surprises are to be expected.

The new paradigm of an abruptly changing climatic system has been well established by research over the last decade, but this new thinking is little known and scarcely appreciated in the wider community of natural and social scientists and policy-makers….

In his book, The Two-Mile Time Machine: Ice Cores, Abrupt Climate Change, and Our Future Richard Alley, one of the world’s leading climate researchers, tells the fascinating history of global climate changes as revealed by reading the annual rings of ice from cores drilled in Greenland. In the 1990s he and his colleagues made headlines with the discovery that the last ice age came to an abrupt end over a period of only three years….http://www.amazon.com/Two-Mile-Time-Machine-Abrupt-Climate/dp/0691102961

herkimer says:
August 14, 2013 at 6:44 amAny comments . I am finding the best correlation in all the CET winter data as well . Could this be mostly a winter and/or a regional correlation ?
There are many correlations with all kinds of things. I have also looked at CET and solar cycles and find the correlation wanting. But that is perhaps explainable by the smallness of the region.
I note that the authors also say: “the average temperature of those winters is increasing and has been for the past three decades. As one piece of evidence of that warming, the Rhine River has not frozen over since 1963. Sirocko said such warming results, in part, from climate change”
So by combining global warming with the Sun you might find something to your liking. I’m not impressed.

Leif Svalgaard says:
August 14, 2013 at 6:49 am
……..
There you go againUsoskin sais that 4a was 7 years long
Usoskin separated cycles by grey barshttp://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/SC4a.htm
Last two grey bars are separated by 3 years. Done!
Sun changes phase every 105-7 years (1800’s, mid 1910s, late 2020’s)http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/107yC.htm
you’ve been recently promoting solar 105 year long cycle, then you deny its existence. Make up your mind, man.

Gail Combs says:
August 14, 2013 at 6:53 amWhat has changed to explain the sudden significant cooling – William Astley
There is no sudden, significant cooling – Leif Svalgaard
HMMMMmmmm, That is not what the geologists tell us.
Note I said ‘is’ and I don’t think geologists [you may mean glaciologists, but let that pass] tell us much about the past decade. And in any event geologists do not posit that lack of sunspots cause the ice sheets to melt in a three years. Perhaps you can dig up some that show that.

vukcevic says:
August 14, 2013 at 6:58 amUsoskin said that 4a was 7 years long
Usoskin separated cycles by grey bars [no he didn’t – the grey bars show where there is no data] Last two grey bars are separated by 3 years. Done!
Not done, bottom panel shows where he put his cycle 4a:
From 1793 to 1800, seven years, Done!

Sun changes phase every 105-7 years (1800’s, mid 1910s, late 2020’s)http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/107yC.htm
We know that it hasn’t changed ‘phase’ since the 1840s. You are a bit vague what you mean by changing phase, presumably polar field sign.

you’ve been recently promoting solar 105 year long cycle, then you deny its existence.
There has been the past three centuries a stochastic variation of the order of 100 years, that is a random occurrence on longer time scales and is not a ‘cycle’. For example 100 years before the low point around 1700 we had the high solar activity that Galileo and others observed.

The 14 winters noted in the Rhine river frezzing area study were also very cold in the CET records . The average winter temperature for the 14 winters noted was about 2C but if you exclude two El Nino type of winters the average was 1.5 C. This is nearly a degree colder than the 2010 cold winter in UK when the winter temperature was 2.4C . So parts of the Rhine froze when there were extremely cold winters in parts of Europe.. 9 of the 14 winters mentioned were at or near solar minimums . I still think the clue to unraveling the sun /climate connection during solar minimums involves seasonal factors , mostly winters and possibly regional consideartions [perhaps northern Hemisphere , northern regions more ]. Solar eruptions impacts including sunspots [or the lack of ] may affect different parts of the globe differently. There is a need for more study in my opinion , rather than just dismissing this because it does not fit what we know today . You have some great graphs and I look some up regularly ,

1.August 8, 2013 at 12:51 pm
2.
Leif Svalgaard, is in a dream wolrd when it comes to what is currently taken place on the sun and the future climatic implications.

3.
Leif has no regard for past history which lends support that the sun is much more variable then what he keeps trying to convey and that the solar conditions during the MAUNDER MINIMUM were very weak(aa index near 0 ,solar wind 200km/sec) and how this correlated to the very cold conditions at that time. In addition he keeps trying to down play the significance of how very very weak solar cycle 24 is and will be going forward.

4.
This flip is nothing like a normal flip and I would not be surprised (as the prolonged solar minimum continues due to angular momentum exerted by the planets on the sun, which Leif also says is not correct) that this may be the last flip , or at the very least the future flips are going to be even less pronounced then even this one.

5.
Leif, and the mainstream keep trying to play up the fact that the sun is acting the same now as it has all of last century which can not be further from the truth.

6.
This cycle could be weaker then solar cycle 5, and is much weaker then solar cycle 14 . Layman sunspot counts and graphs which are correct show this clearly to be the case.

7.
The AP index and solar flux going forward will end this debate, and as of today we have solar flux around 105 at the maximum ! It should be north of 150.

8.
Also since Oct 2005 the AP index has been extremely low and I expect sub 5 will be the rule in the not to distant future, at least post 2015.

9.
Once the solar parameters hit the levels I have been saying (see below) I list the potential secondary effects which could take place as a result.

14.
5. ap index 5 or lower with isolated spikes will cause the plates to be more unstable, more volcanic activity and earthquake activity. more shocks to the magnetosphere.

15.
6. low solar in addition to being correlated with an increase in major volcanic activity and earthquakes in and around the solar minimums also can be tied to a cold pdo/amo. a cold pdo translates to more la ninas versus el ninos the result global cooling.

16.
7. low solar actiivty having severe impacts to the Thermosphere and Ionopsphere.
Thermosphere will contract and cool substancially during a prolonged solar minimum which will inter act with all the other layers of the atmosphere.

17.
This explanation is the ONLY explanation that can explain the many past abrupt climatic changes of the past both up and down. There are no other explanations from Milankovitch Cycles, to the Thermohaline circulation shutting down, to extra terrestrial impacts,to the sudden increases in greenhouse gases like methane or co2 etc etc.

18.
The explanation above shows how the climate could be brought to thresholds if the solar parameters change in degree of magnitude strong enough and for a period of duration long enough following a sufficient number of years of sub- solar activity in general, which no other explanation is able to show.

19.
Thresholds have to be met to flip the climate from one climatic regime to another. When the climate is in the same climatic regime changes are gradual and slow and always stay within particular boundaries.

20.
I am still waiting for alternative explanations, have yet to see one.

Leif has no explanations to explain climate change,and yet he tires to down play explanations such as the one I have presented based on past history data and extrapolation based on that data going forward.

Salvatore Del Prete says:
August 14, 2013 at 9:11 amI am still waiting
You are still polluting WUWT with your opinions. All of which do not accord with the facts. But since they are only opinions and you are entitled to any opinion whatsoever it is not worthwhile trying to show where your ‘points’ are wrong: It will not change your opinions and might be inflicting psychological damage, so I’ll spare you.

Salvatore Del Prete says:
August 14, 2013 at 9:20 amLeif give us your theory on climate change?
The climate changes all the time, that is what things complicated enough such as the climate do. Those changes are unpredictable [except the ones directly caused by changing orbit and tilt]. To pretend otherwise might be fun, but is not science.

Salvatore Del Prete says:
August 14, 2013 at 9:24 amLeif needs to educate himself by reading what famed geologist Don Easterbrook has to say about things.
Sal needs to educate himself/herself by reading what famed climatologist Jim Hansen has to say about things.
REPLY: I agree, Salvatore Del Prete is getting way off base here. Time for some self education to prevent yourself from becoming a permanent troll bin resident – Anthony

Salvatore Del Prete says:
August 14, 2013 at 9:43 amLeif tries to make it seem I am alone in my thoughts about solar/climate relationships , when in reality many agree with my basic positions.
Many people [millions! billions?] smoke therefore that is a good thing to do…
BTW are your ‘basic positions’ identical to your 22 [or whatever] points, or are they limited to a tiny subset of them? [if so, which ones?]

Ric Werme says:
August 14, 2013 at 9:48 amThe Svensmark effect should be most apparent in low maritime areas with clean air. I think the existing solar observatories will do fine.
Ric, Vuk was talking about 1809 and 1811. There were no ‘existing’ solar observatories then. Vuk is trying to have you believe that his formula [or worse, just recent values form 2020s moved back in time 200+ years] predicts two reversals of the polar fields [in 1809 and 1811] meaning there should have been two solar maxima in those years [separated by a minimum in 1810 and making a lost solar cycle with a length of only two years, wrongly citing Usoskin as claiming his lost cycle 4a lasted only three years], but that the weather was so bad that the sunspots were not observed, although out of the 730 days of 1809 and 1811, only 17 had no observations.

Salvatore Del Prete says:
August 14, 2013 at 9:43 amLeif you are still trying to convince everyone that you and only you are correct and everyone else is wrong.
Two men meet a bear in the woods. “Run” shouts the first man. Second man says “silly you, you cannot outrun a bear”. First man: “I don’t need to, I just have to outrun you”.

Salvatore Del Prete says:
August 14, 2013 at 9:53 amI think diversity of opinions is good.
apparently you do not think that my opinion is good to be included in that ‘diversity’, and opinions are not equal, as the pig said “some are more equal than others”.

Ed,
You are cherry picking your data on the budgets. The last term of Bush2 was bumped up extremely high due to a portion of TARP and other bailouts. Then this totally new baseline, up from around $2.2 trillion was now established at $3.4 trillion. But of course, there is no justification of keeping this inflated budget, and Obama and company continue an $85 billion dollar a month “stimulus”, which is THEIR DECISION. So your guys are blowing an extra trillion a year. And please, stop assuming that ANY conservatives were happy with republican president spending, especially Bush2, that is a huge strawman. So, please let us know just what a GOOD number is for a national debt, and how we will all benefit……$30 trillion, $40 trillion? And things will be better how? Ugh man.

herkimer says:
August 14, 2013 at 7:44 am
………….
Thanks Herkimer
I look at data and if find something odd, plot a graph (visual impressions are usually far more informative than a verbal description) and report the finding, voicing an opinion, right or wrong doesn’t concern me too much, if badly wrong someone will correct it.
I’ve looked at the CET data for 3-4 years now and may have just about grasped the basics.
Central Europe should also be affected by the Atlantic but likely to a different degree.
Sometime ago I came across a graph representing C. Europe (I believe average of 3 locations, including Germany).
At first impression trends are considerably differenthttp://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/2CETs.htm
However a shift of 0.5C around 1830s to about 1960s (or about 2 AMO cycles) shows an indisputable correlation of two sets of temperatures.
One could speculate for reason, from erroneous data to some natural variability affecting differently two regions barely 1000km apart. If data is correct, the above example shows futility of global temperatures averaging.

Ric Werme says:
August 14, 2013 at 9:48 am
…..
Hi Ric
I was just to write a comment, when I noticed that Dr. S ‘understood far better’ than I do what I meant.
My wife possesses a similar gift of nature.

Leif Svalgaard: Since UV/EUV is [but a tiny] part of TSI, its variation is subsumed into that of TSI. If TSI varied by 2 W/m2 the variation of UV/EUV at the same time would be much less than 2 W/m2, something like 0.02 W/m2 or less.

I find your posts informative, and I admire your stamina in debating the ideas that you disagree with. I think that it is too soon to rule out the possibility that the fluctuations in UV can produce fluctuations in the Earth’s climate. Even though the UV is a small fraction of TSI, it is all absorbed in the upper atmosphere, and the absorption maintains the upper atmosphere at a high temperature (this comes from Murry Salby’s book: Physics of the Atmosphere and Climate); if the UV increases by a factor of 10 (as was reported in a paper discussed here), that is enough to produce a large enough change in the upper atmosphere as to change the Earth surface temperature by 1% by changing the amount of other wavelengths of light that pass through the upper atmosphere. I don’t think anyone has made a strong case that this does or does not happen..

Matthew R Marler says:
August 14, 2013 at 11:07 amif the UV increases by a factor of 10 (as was reported in a paper discussed here), that is enough to produce a large enough change in the upper atmosphere as to change the Earth surface temperature by 1% by changing the amount of other wavelengths of light that pass through the upper atmosphere.
This is the problem: the UV changes depend very much on wavelength. The shorter wavelength vary by 100% [or a factor of two – not ten], but are absorbed so high up that it doesn’t matter; the density is a trillion times smaller than at the surface. The UV that penetrates deeper [to where the density is a thousand times smaller than at the surface] varies a lot less [only a few percent], so is much further away from a factor of ten.

I share the concern of many here that global cooling is a credible possibility in the near future, and that it could threaten the very survival of civilization. While the relationship between sunspot activity and “ice ages” is not clear, that between sunspot activity and solar EMP seems fairly well established.

The question that troubles me most in this respect is whether the current downward trend in sunspot activity guarantees that no solar EMP event of Carrington magnitude can occur within the next year or two.

Is there any reliable data that addresses this question?

I’d also like to hear engineering appraisals of the threat a large solar EMP event poses to the global power distribution grids, communications networks, shipping, road, rail, and air traffic, and personal computers and storage devices. The sketchy reports published in popular publications like National Geographic suggest that all of the above could be rendered non-functional, and possibly irreparable, by such an event. Publicly available advice to the private citizen on such simple questions as shielding electronic devices in storage is skimpy and wildly contradictory.

If the conditions for an ice age preclude such an event occurring, then I’ll be cheering for global cooling, as I feel we have at least a chance of saving our data, technology, and a viable fragment of breeding population, with continued access to our current tools and know-how. But a sudden global loss of power, communications, and data would likely doom our hopelessly overextended civilization to a very nasty end, which an ice age would (perhaps mercifully) accelerate, at least in the temperate regions.

My apologies for these crassly utilitarian questions. I’m encouraged, however, by the observation that posts (eg. “waclimate”‘s) urging elected government to regulate income redistribution by refusing to honour its contractual obligations (at least those to unpopular groups, such as “the wealthy”) are acceptable.

otropogo says:
August 14, 2013 at 11:45 amThe question that troubles me most in this respect is whether the current downward trend in sunspot activity guarantees that no solar EMP event of Carrington magnitude can occur within the next year or two.
Is there any reliable data that addresses this question?
From our prediction paper. http://www.leif.org/research/Cycle%2024%20Smallest%20100%20years.pdf :
“Svalgaard et al., 2003]. Average space weather might be ‘‘milder’’ with decreased solar activity, but the extreme events that dominate technological effects are not expected to disappear. In fact, they may become more common. Two of the eight strongest storms in the last 150 years occurred during solar cycle 14 (Rmax = 64) [Cliver and Svalgaard, 2004], while three of the five largest 30 MeV solar energetic proton events since 1859 [McCracken et al., 2001] occurred during cycle 13 (Rmax = 88)”
And the Carrington event itself occurred in a rather inconspicuous cycle Rmax = 98.

Gail Combs says:
August 14, 2013 at 6:36 am
William Astley says: @ August 14, 2013 at 1:32 am
…Cooling is a more serious issue for the warmists to explain. It is not physically possible in a democracy with a free press to hide cooling…..
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
I agree that cooling is the more serious issue but I hate to tell you we do not have a ‘Free Press’ We have a bought and paid for press. (see my comment at this link )
The most recent example of the ‘Free Press’ lying through their teeth to hoodwink the public is this:
Yahoo: Climate Change Is Threatening the Power Grid
Top News Today:
Climate Change Is Threatening the Power Grid
Just days away from the 10-year anniversary of the worst power outage in U.S. history, the White House and the Energy Department released a report on Monday evaluating the resiliency of the nation’s electric grid and recommending steps to prevent future blackouts. full story

William:
Global cooling due to the solar cycle 24 change would change both the scientific and political discussion.

The liberals should be rejoicing that there is no global warming problem to solve. There are limited public funds to spend on solving ‘problems’. Even so as your links note spending money on green scams is madness. The liberals and vote buying politicians (politician will spend all of the funds and then borrow to the max.) have a never ending list of issues they would like to spend money on.
Best wishes
William

William Astley says:
August 14, 2013 at 12:57 pmGlobal cooling due to the solar cycle 24 change would change both the scientific and political discussion.
Except that neither you nor anybody would know that it was cycle 24 that caused the cooling, so no discussion will change. For example there was cooling from 1940 to the 1970s. What caused that? solar activity was generally increasing when the cooling was the most severe.

William Astley says:
August 14, 2013 at 12:57 pm
Global cooling due to the solar cycle 24 change would change both the scientific and political discussion.
Except that neither you nor anybody would know that it was cycle 24 that caused the cooling, so no discussion will change. For example there was cooling from 1940 to the 1970s. What caused that? solar activity was generally increasing when the cooling was the most severe.

William
Your question is valid. There are sets of anomalies if one tries to explain the past temperature changes.

Look at how planetary temperature has changed in other periods. CO2 increased continually from 1850 to 1910 yet the planet cooled. How is that possible? There has recently been 16 years with no increase in planetary temperature during the period in which there was the greatest increase in atmospheric CO2. How is that possible? The fact that are no answers to those questions indicates there are multiple errors in the current climate change science that is used to create the general circulation models.

If the sun is causing what is observed, what is missing is a deeper understanding of the mechanisms, how the sun can change, and how the sun has changed in the past. The mechanisms are more complicate than the solar magnetic cycle modulation of GCR. As you pointed out GCR increased significantly during the solar cycle 23/24 transition yet the planet did not cool. That is possible if there is a mechanism that inhibits the GCR modulation of planetary clouds which explains the delay in cooling of 10 to 12 years when solar cycle length has increased in the past. Why is there correlation of planetary temperature changes with solar cycle length? What is the mechanism? What is happening to the sun to inhibit the GCR mechanism?

The current data and recent analysis by Lindzen and Choi (two fundamental papers) supports the assertion that the planet resists rather than amplifies forcing changes. Accepting that fact or if you prefer accept that hypothesis conditionally means planetary temperature will no longer just chaotically change, there needs to be a forcing function to change planetary temperature.

If I understand the mechanisms there will be significant and rapid cooling caused by the solar cycle 24 changes. What is delaying that cooling is the mechanism that was inhibiting GCR modulation of planetary clouds. Significant, rapid cooling is a game changer. The media and the public will ask: What has changed to cause the cooling? How long will the cooling last? How is it possible for the planet to cool when atmospheric CO2 is rising?

The public and media will not accept that statement that climate is chaotic or the scientific community does not know or the planet is going to warm later due to atmospheric CO2 rise.

William Astley says:
August 14, 2013 at 3:22 pmIf I understand the mechanisms there will be significant and rapid cooling caused by the solar cycle 24 changes.
But you don’t, and you don’t know that there will be rapid cooling. So far, there is no sign of it.

The public and media will not accept that statement that climate is chaotic or the scientific community does not know
They will accept that there is great uncertainty, rather than simplistic ‘solutions’ such as CO2 or ‘solar cycle magnetic changes’.

vukcevic says:
August 14, 2013 at 3:28 pmthe AMO, driven by variability in the Arctic-North Atlantic currents flow.
Not responsive, and you have no believable evidence for that.

vukcevic says:
August 14, 2013 at 3:28 pmthe AMO, driven by variability in the Arctic-North Atlantic currents flow.
Here is a scientific explanation:
“The physical processes associated with the 70-yr period climate mode, known as the Atlantic multidecadal oscillation (AMO), are examined. Based on analyses of observational data, a deterministic mechanism relying on atmosphere–ocean–sea ice interactions is proposed for the AMO. Variations in the thermohaline circulation are reflected as uniform sea surface temperature anomalies in the North Atlantic. These anomalies are associated with a hemispheric wavenumber-1 sea level pressure (SLP) structure in the atmosphere that is amplified through atmosphere–ocean interactions in the North Pacific. The SLP pattern and its associated wind field affect the sea ice export through Fram Strait, the freshwater balance in the northern North Atlantic, and consequently the strength of the large-scale ocean circulation. It generates sea surface temperature anomalies with opposite signs in the North Atlantic and completes a negative feedback. The authors find that the time scale of the cycle is associated with the thermohaline circulation adjustment to freshwater forcing, the SST response to it, the oceanic adjustment in the North Pacific, and the sea ice response to the wind forcing. Finally, it is argued that the Great Salinity Anomaly in the late 1960s and 1970s is part of AMO.”

“… Average space weather might be ‘‘milder’’ with decreased solar activity, but the extreme events that dominate technological effects are not expected to disappear. In fact, they may become more common.”

Thanks Leif. How much warning can the North American public reasonably expect to have of such a potentially devastating event? And is any credible shielding strategy, at least for digitalized data and PCs, available to the general public?

Here in Canada, the government weather alert radio network is limited to issuing automatic alerts only for atmospheric storms and tsunamis, and the network has extremely poor coverage. Air-raid type sirens have largely vanished, so alerting the public in the dead of the night is impossible.

otropogo says:
August 14, 2013 at 5:04 pmThanks Leif. How much warning can the North American public reasonably expect to have of such a potentially devastating event?
About 15+ hours.,And is any credible shielding strategy, at least for digitalized data and PCs, available to the general public?
Back up your data to an external drive or tape while you still have electricity. Then pack the drive in aluminium foil or one of those special anti-static pouches. Your main concerns are electricity, water, food, ammo, etc.

A heatwave? We had a heatwave, I just don’t know if one week of 90’s has made up for 1.5 months of 75’s in june, july and august, And all summer when I’ve been watching F1 and MotoGP races in Europe almost all of them have been cool, I’ve even seen them wearing coats.

Mario Lento says:
August 13, 2013 at 10:00 pm
WACLIMATE: Could you provide the source of 50million per year in cost to tax payers in WA? If this is true, I would like to be able to use this fact in an argument. Wow – that’s quite a hefty loss for tax payers in one state if true.

Mario … sorry for the delay in my response. To quote the senior columnist in The West Australian newspaper a couple of days ago: “Here is the truth about the State Government’s solar panel subsidy scheme. It was poorly designed from the start, appallingly administered by the bureaucracy and will end up costing taxpayers and electricity consumers $453 million over the next decade. All for negligible environmental benefit.”

I say half a billion because I’m yet to see the cost of any government scheme over 10 years not increase by at least 10% as the years roll by, and I’m dubious about any environmental benefit from a negligible reduction in CO2 fertiliser. The official data states that if the 40 to 20 cent tariff cut happened it would save taxpayers $51.2 million over the next four years, but that’s budget revenue projections without the bigger component paid by the other 800,000 households for escalating power prices to cover the shortfall in maintenance income for the generator and supply companies.

This dumb-ass scheme was introduced by the Liberals but to quote our Liberal premier yesterday: “The scheme is flawed. It is fundamentally flawed. Every version of the scheme is flawed. And we’ve got to take responsibility for that. Other electricity consumers, generally on lower incomes, are cross-subsidising people who one way or another were able to buy rooftop solar panels. It is an income redistribution in the wrong direction.”

The government caved in after intense pressure from media, academia, the renewable energy sector (what a surprise!), national colleagues alarmed about an anti-Lib backlash with a Federal election a month from now, and affected solar rebate users screaming that they’d been betrayed by promises not kept. Their arguments are that they prevent the need for construction of another fossil power station and the increased power prices for the other 800,000 households have been exaggerated – all a bit dubious with well over 1,000 immigrants settling in WA each week.

Three years ago (http://www.smh.com.au/environment/energy-smart/solar-flareup-will-burn-a-hole-in-every-pocket-20101030-17862.html) it was documented that NSW customers would pay an extra $100 per year for electricity to pay for that state’s cockeyed solar rebate scheme, more for regional customers. Note that WA covers more than 2.5 million square kilometres and has just 2.5 million residents, most in a few cities, with an obligation to provide reliable grid power to almost all of them along a vast network of mostly wooden poles with decades of weather and termite damage. It’s not cheap.

The accepted wisdom within the left and right seems to be that the vast majority including the poor can go to hell for the next 10 years as long as the well-off, mostly free electricity, subsidised bunch can also make a profit while demanding grid reliability for the two months per year when there’s not enough sunshine. That’s considered more ethical than a government breaking its word, even though the government claims the contracts legally allowed tariff variations. This whole mess stinks of greed for votes and greed for money.

Hey WACLIMATE: Thank you. I am so dead set against all the various tax incentives for Green. They are so much in denial about the sheer amount of tax payer funded welfare the green industry gets. It’s the same will all liberal programs. The real tax payers in the private sector also need to worry about their own retirement and then pay so that government workers have a free pension.

MiCro says:
August 14, 2013 at 7:43 pmnd all summer when I’ve been watching F1 and MotoGP races in Europe almost all of them have been cool, I’ve even seen them wearing coats.
My wife just came home from three weeks in Germany and complained about the incessant heat…
But weather is not climate. Average over 30 years and you get climate.

Leif Svalgaard says:
August 14, 2013 at 3:50 pm
……
Not much to dispute there except that the longest AMO period (not a cycle in strict sense) from various reconstructions is about 65 and shortest about 55 years.
Link to SLP is obvious and is bidirectional.
Siberian rivers fresh water supply and subsequent ice volumes flow through the Fram straits are critical factors.
However that is not all, there is a strong correlation between ‘truncated AMO’ (AMO1) and Reykjavik summer atmospheric pressure but currently at an extraordinary 11 year delay. There is no such correlation of any kind (with or without delay) with the winter pressure, possible something to do with the summer’s ice free area just north of Icelandhttp://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/AMO-NAO.htm
Delay is made of two chunks (6 + 5 years, since 1910 and 1950 respectively), that kind of delay can be attributed only to the ocean currents and unlikely to be just a coincidence.

According to the famous energy flow diagram by Trenberth and Fasullo, about 22% of the incoming solar radiation is absorbed in the atmosphere. Granted the region of absorption does not have a high density, that is a non-negligible total energy flow.

Matthew R Marler says:
August 15, 2013 at 7:55 amAccording to the famous energy flow diagram by Trenberth and Fasullo, about 22% of the incoming solar radiation is absorbed in the atmosphere. Granted the region of absorption does not have a high density, that is a non-negligible total energy flow.
That 22% is mostly not UV [there isn’t that much UV in TSI, only some 10%].

leif says
For example there was cooling from 1940 to the 1970s. What caused that?
henry says
it was caused by the USA, UK, and France deciding to explode atomic bombs in the South Pacific, causing an overall decline in greenery, there, on earth, but it won’t change that much which is coming from the tophttp://blogs.24.com/henryp/2013/04/29/the-climate-is-changing/

HenryP says:
August 15, 2013 at 9:28 am“For example there was cooling from 1940 to the 1970s. What caused that?”
it was caused by the USA, UK, and France deciding to explode atomic bombs in the South Pacific
Hare-brained idea. The standard explanation is the increasing aerosols after WWII, which finally was brought under control in the US and Europe by the 1970s. The story may be repeating itself now with increasing aerosols from China, India, and other developing countries, briefly counteracting the natural global warming.

Hi Leif: The story may be repeating itself now with increasing aerosols from China, India, and other developing countries, briefly counteracting the natural global warming.

This is a whole other topic which I find interesting. First, I acknowledge that you wrote “natural” global warming. Could you extrapolate on the cause of the natural warming we’ve seen (through the 20th century)?

I’ve read counter points to the aerosols from China/India causing cooling, though I remain neutral in my beliefs here.

@leif
I observed independently that if you destroy greenery (like they did destroy forests in the south of ARG) you get (local) cooling (look at the results from Tandil in my tables?)
There were a no. of reports I watched from people living in the S-P that greenery want down after the nuclear tests
hence my conclusion
but you donot have to believe ithttp://blogs.24.com/henryp/2013/04/29/the-climate-is-changing/

Mario Lento says:
August 15, 2013 at 9:47 amCould you extrapolate on the cause of the natural warming we’ve seen (through the 20th century)?
Mo, just as I cannot extrapolate on the shape of the next cloud to appear up in the sky above me [hard to do in California in the first place :-) ]

We are going through a dry period in NE Oregon. Whenever that happens we also get dry dusty air. Might that happen when over-abundant flora, having greened up during wetter conditions, turns to dust under dryer conditions and ends up as aerosols aka “dust-bowls”?

Leif Svalgaard says:
August 15, 2013 at 10:02 am
Mario Lento says:
August 15, 2013 at 9:47 am
Could you extrapolate on the cause of the natural warming we’ve seen (through the 20th century)?
Mo, just as I cannot extrapolate on the shape of the next cloud to appear up in the sky above me [hard to do in California in the first place :-) ]
+++++++++
I thought I was close to having you tell us the answer. You’ve been consistent in not guessing. That you said “natural” I do not take lightly and did not want to take that out of context. Can I say that you do believe the warming we’ve seen is largely due to natural causes of which there are many, and therefore probably not due to anthropogenic CO2?

Mario Lento says:
August 15, 2013 at 10:26 amCan I say that you do believe the warming we’ve seen is largely due to natural causes of which there are many, and therefore probably not due to anthropogenic CO2?
Words and precision are important. CO2 has undoubtedly made a contribution, the Sun has made a contribution, ocean circulation has made a contribution, aliens from outer space have made a contribution, etc, etc, etc. The problem is that we do not the proportions of each of those contributions. Boiling it down to a binary choice is wrong, nay, silly, nay-nay, dumb.

New paper finds a significant increase of solar radiation received at Earth’s surface 1993-2003

A paper published today in Atmospheric Research examines solar radiation received at the Earth’s surface at a mountaintop station in Poland from 1964-2003, and finds a significant increase over the period 1993-2003 in comparison to 1964-1992. The paper adds to many other peer-reviewed publications finding “global brightening” of solar radiation received at the Earth’s surface in the latter 20th century, which has had 26 times more climate forcing effect than CO2 over a comparable time period.

Figure 5 shows that the solar cycle variation is of the order of 0.1 C. This is what I expect.

Allright now I have to read the whole thing again to find what “amplification” he is talking about :(

“We find that the total radiative forcing associated with solar cycles variations is about 5 to 7 times larger than just those associated with the TSI variations, thus implying the necessary existence of an amplification mechanism..”

If he means primarily OHC, I fail to see how OHC can vary on a wider scale than SST??

HenryP says:
August 15, 2013 at 10:46 amCO2 has undoubtedly made a contribution
you must be joking as you said (you believed) the opposite to me on a previous thread
So how did you calculate that the net effect of more CO2 must be warming rather than cooling?
You should pay some attention rather than SHOUTING. “If the argument is weak, raise your voice, if it is wrong, SHOUT”.
CO2 warms at some altitudes and cools at other [higher] altitudes. Nobody knows how much, and nobody knows how much the other contributions are. People who think it is a binary choice are just plain dumb. I hope you do not fall in that category. Please confirm.

phodges says:
August 15, 2013 at 11:29 amIf he means primarily OHC, I fail to see how OHC can vary on a wider scale than SST??
Well, you brought up the paper…

Co2 and for that matter the greenhouse gas effect are a result of the climate not the cause of it.

The climatic system /oceanic system are driven by the sun,therefore it stands to reason any changes in solar output (variations) will have an effect on these two systems which in turn will have an effect on the climate.

The catch is the degree of magnitude change and duration of time of the solar variations must reach certain LEVELS in order to overcome the inherent negative feedbacks in earth’s climatic system ,along with natural earth bound random climate events(examples enso,volcanic activity).

In addition there are climatic thresholds that may be or may not be reached, which are directly tied to the degree in variation (magnitude change /duration of time)of the various items that control the climate. The sunbeing the source.
This is why it is very difficult to come up with correlations because there are so many parts of the climate system moving at the same time and many times in opposition as far as their evenual impacts on the climate.

Salvatore Del Prete says:
August 15, 2013 at 11:48 amThis is why it is very difficult to come up with correlations because there are so many parts of the climate system moving at the same time and many times in opposition as far as their eventual impacts on the climate.
and is the very reason it is very difficult to show that the Sun has much to do with anything. Your argument cuts both ways.

HenryP says:
August 15, 2013 at 12:07 pmwhat is it?
Pay attention to what I said: nobody knows for sure.

it is nothing or next to nothing compared to natural factors as proven
I take a dim view of people who say that they have ‘proven’ anything. Your bar is obviously lower; much lower, perhaps; too low, probably.

This is what Piers Corbyn says: http://www.weatheraction.com/displayarticle.asp?a=570&c=5
“Hello and Welcome!
Dramatic Solar events confirm Weather Action forecast at start of new ‘Top Red’ Weather (R5) period* 15-17th August (*and Quake Trial Risk periods).
Aug 15 Huge Earth-Facing Coronal Hole & Active Regions (M class AR1817+AR1818) confirm WeatherAction SLAT9A Forecast.
Aug 14 pics* above coming to centre line on 15th – The start day of new TopRed R5 15-17th (Weather) and QV5 15-19th (Quakes) periods
* http://spaceweather.com/archive.php?day=14&month=08&year=2013&view=view
CORONAL HOLE: A coronal hole has formed in the sun’s northern hemisphere, and it is spewing solar wind into space. NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory photographed the UV-dark gap during the early hours of August 14th:
In the image, above, the sun’s magnetic field is traced by white curving lines. The coronal hole is where those magnetic field lines have opened up, allowing solar wind to escape. A stream of solar wind flowing from this coronal hole is expected to reach Earth on August 16-18. NOAA forecasters estimate a 25% chance of polar geomagnetic storms when the windy stream arrives”.
“It’s a “Wild Jet Stream Age”
Piers Corbyn says: “These are are very interesting weather times and a test for SLAT9(A) forecast advances which should capture cut-off and blocking highs better.
What is going on is fully in line with the now developing Wild Jet Stream Age or Mini Ice Age – an overall description of average temerature drops despite opposite extremes at times.
The message of the age is:
“Don’t get used to any weather. Get used to dramatic changes and contrasts in overall much colder temperate regions of the globe which will generally be very bad for agriculture and the world economy for the next 25 years”
“In terms of what drives weather it is amazing that we can make these forecasts of solar activity and weather 20 weeks ahead (or often longer) and discuss the results in terms of uncertainties of a day or so or a hundred miles or so of weather.”
“It is even more amazing that CO2 warmists who can predict nothing and are now not even sure if warming means getting colder can pass as anything other than charlatans”.
“We hope existing users will do their best to promote our foreacst offers & rapidly get more forecast users on board. That way we bring down charges & advance science sooner. Thank you”

I presume that dr. Svalgaard does not agree with his collegue the famous astrophycisist Piers Corbyn? Time will tell who is right and who is wrong.

HenryP says:
August 15, 2013 at 12:40 pmif you remove a few people like Galileo, Newton, Edison, Einstein etc
where would we be today?
I take an even dimmer view of people who compare themselves with Galileo, Newton, etc

what did you think of my 4th connection (the planets)?
Not much.

Argiris Diamantis says:
August 15, 2013 at 12:49 pmI presume that dr. Svalgaard does not agree with his collegue the famous astrophycisist Piers Corbyn?
Piers is not a famous ‘astrophycisist’ [sic].Time will tell who is right and who is wrong.
No matter what happens, Corbyn and his followers [and clients] will say that they were right. As for the clients, they have to say so, because they paid good money for this and nobody wants to admit they have been fools.

Argiris Diamantis says:
August 15, 2013 at 12:49 pmI presume that dr. Svalgaard does not agree with his colleague the famous astrophysicist Piers Corbyn?
Enter ‘Corbyn’ in http://adswww.harvard.edu/ and see the publications and citations of Corbyn. There are none by Piers.

A Little Ice Age is predicted based on solar patterns. It could be the equivalent of a nuclear winter, says Len Maier, president of Friends of Science. “At such a time, an abundance of carbon dioxide (CO2) would be a benefit. CO2 helps crops grow.”

NASA – Solar patterns are repeating themselves right now

The last “Little Ice Age,” from about 1350-1850, coincided with a period of very low sunspot activity, frigid temperatures and crop failures. NASA reports that such solar patterns are repeating themselves right now as the sun’s cycle 24 “maximum” peaks.

This winter and spring, snow storms blanketed the US and Europe in unexpected fury. This despite Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) scientists previous claims that global warming would make snowfall “a very rare and exciting event“.

Climate models issued by the IPCC overestimated the warming trends in the tropical atmosphere since 1979 by

That article came out today on the web-site iceagenow.com, and supports what I have been trying to say.
We will find out one way or the other ,because this current solar cycle will be the WEAKEST since solar cycle 5.

The evidence has been mounting toward global cooling in contrast to global warming from the atmospheric circulation patterns(more -ao), to low solar activity, to the an end of the global temp. rises, to the cold pdo/more la ninas,no further ocean heat content rise, to antarctica sea ice expansions, while the arctic sea ice is no longer on the decline,to arctic temp. north of 80 degrees north latitude continuing to display record cold conditions this past summer, low tropical activity, low tornadic activity etc etc.

Still no tropospheric hot spot near the equator, still no pornounced stratospheric cooling especially near the poles both of which are cornerstones of the global waming models, along with the more zonal (+ao) atmospheric circulation pattern.

I am fairly confident that the decline in temperatures will commence once solar flux readings decline from here and continue for many years to come. It is sooner rather then later.

Piers Corbyn should not be taken lightly. In this enviroment (global warming subjectiveness ) it is hard for scientist like Piers to get papers published by the establishment because it goes against what they want to hear.

Leif Svalgaard calls followers and clients of Piers Corbyn “fools”. He says Piers Corbyn is not a famous astrophysicist.
There is a discussion forum on WUWT (Anthony Watts) about Solar Cycle 24 continues to slump. https://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/08/13/solar-cycle-24-continues-the-slump/#comments.
I have put a recent posting from Piers on that forum (the message of the age) and I have asked dr. Svalgaard to comment on this.
This is what he said:
Argiris Diamantis says:
August 15, 2013 at 12:49 pm
I presume that dr. Svalgaard does not agree with his colleague the famous astrophysicist Piers Corbyn?
Enter ‘Corbyn’ in http://adswww.harvard.edu/ and see the publications and citations of Corbyn. There are none by Piers.
Time will tell who is right and who is wrong.
No matter what happens, Corbyn and his followers [and clients] will say that they were right. As for the clients, they have to say so, because they paid good money for this and nobody wants to admit they have been fools.
So far the very dissapointing reaction from dr. Svalgaard.
Piers Corbyn has predicted the coldest winter in a century. That prediction was right, and the chance this was just coincidence is very, very small. Svalgaard had not predicted this. Time after time Piers’ predictions turned out to be right. I guess the Harvard library is full of scientific articles written by people whose predictions turned out to be wrong. In my eyes Piers is a top scientist, and Boris Johnson – the London mayor – agrees with me. Leif Svalgaard had better choose his words more carefully. The theory behind Piers’ SLAT (Solar Lunar Action) technique must be right because the predictions based on it were right. The proof of the pudding is in the eating. Like the late Feynman used to say: If the theory doesn’t fit the facts, the theory is wrong. The Harvard library that Svalgaard refers to is full of studies that did not fit the facts. The definition of a top astrophysicist is not someone whose name is on the Harvard list (the list of failures, like the far too many greenhouse gas bla-bla-bla studies), but someone whose theory is confirmed by the facts. We will see who is right and who is wrong, time will tell. If I were a gambler, I would put my money on Piers Corbyn.

Salvatore Del Prete says:
August 16, 2013 at 10:10 amThe bottomline is there is and will continue to be a move toward solar causes for climate change, and away from co2 causes for climate change.
As I said: people who believe it is a binary choice are DUMB.
And BTW, it is not ‘climate change’ anymore. It is now ‘carbon pollution’ [which is hardly due to the Sun :-) ]

Argiris Diamantis says:
August 16, 2013 at 12:06 pmHe says Piers Corbyn is not a famous astrophysicist.
And right I am: Enter ‘Corbyn’ in http://adswww.harvard.edu/ and see the publications and citations of Corbyn. There are none by Piers. So, not an astrophysicist and not famous. Perhaps ‘infamous’ or ‘notorious’ is what you meant. Please confirm.

In that article he quotes NASA’s Science News report for January 8, 2013,

“Indeed, the sun could be on the threshold of a mini-Maunder event right now. Ongoing Solar Cycle 24 [the current short term 11 year cycle] is the weakest in more than 50 years. Moreover, there is (controversial) evidence of a long-term weakening trend in the magnetic field strength of sunspots. Matt Penn and William Livingston of the National Solar Observatory predict that by the time Solar Cycle 25 arrives, magnetic fields on the sun will be so weak that few if any sunspots will be formed. Independent lines of research involving helioseismology and surface polar fields tend to support their conclusion.”

“That is even more significant,” says Ferrara, “because NASA’s climate science has been controlled for years by global warming hysteric James Hansen, who recently announced his retirement.”

“This same concern is increasingly being echoed worldwide,” Ferrara continues, quoting from The Voice of Russia on April

It is no use denying that Piers Corbyn is an astrophysicist, I wonder why you say such things. Already as a child Piers was occupied with physics. I will quote now some achievements during his adult life from his very extensive CV:
Quote: Academic achievements …
Piers won a Royal Scholarship to Imperial College London in 1965 to study Physics,
– came top of the class in the first exam there.
– was President of The Royal College Of Science Mathematical and Physical Society for one year
and organised a series of notable ‘pretty exciting’ lectures on ‘Problems and Paradoxes in Physics’, the
most notable contributor at the time being Professor PMS Blackett President of The Royal Society on
‘Rock Magnetism’
– obtained a first class honours degree in Physics from Imperial College in 1968
– President Of Imperial College student Union 1969-1970 (and entertained HM Queen for Tea at IC
in Autumn 1969)
Piers has carried out research in superconductivity (at IC), and – at QMC and independently – in
cosmology, solar physics and Sun-Earth relations and (more recently) in Sun-Earth weather links and in
He has lectured extensively and set exams in mathematics and Physics at South Bank University,
Goldsmiths College (University of London) and other institutions.
He holds an MSc in Astrophysics from Queen Mary College London.
(…)
Publications, papers and presentations
Piers has published and delivered copious papers, articles and presentations in peer-reviewed
scientific publications and **many UK and international prestigious conferences – see below for
shortlist which includes at least 12 published papers and lists many presentations which have a
similar practical status to peer-review and will lead to publications. Articles in production and more
business type or Science / Astronomical society meetings and conference proceedings not listed.
Piers’ qualifications, knowledge and drive in Physics, astrophysics and theoretical physics are the tools
which made his development of his solar-magnetic activity based Solar Weather Technique of long range
forecasting and applications to meteorology possible. In addition Piers’ forecasting organisations /
companies have always also employed the services of practicing commercial and qualified meteorologists.
1967 Three papers for work done while at school – Adam’s Grammar School, Newport Shropshire – 1965
and published two years later, namely:-
1967 March. The Geographical Journal pp54; The size and Shape of Pebbles on Chesil beach.
1967 Sept. Weather (Journal of Royal Meteorological Society) pp378; A Brine Barometer and a True
Mean Electrical Thermometer.
1967 Oct. Journal of Brit Astronomical Association pp424; A simple Solar Experiment (re measuring the
eccentricity of Earth’s orbit).
These three papers involved some of the vast amount of practical / scientific things Piers got up to as child
and youth. {..}.
His birthday March 10th 1947 was the day of the thaw with storms and gales after the great snows of Feb-
March 1947 and marked by coincidentally by ‘The Great sunspot of 1947’! (See page 3 of:http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/7.02/weather.html?pg=3&topic=&topic_set= )
Piers’ first scientific ‘experiment’ of any size was done at the age of 8 years old when he dug what he
described as ‘a dew pond’ in the garden (at Kingston St Michael, nr Chippenham Wiltshire). From 1956 to 1965 (when he went to IC) he lived near Newport Shropshire and did lots of scientific activity – with his
own home made weather instruments and many other things.
1984 In: Clusters and Groups Of Galaxies, F Mardirossian et al (eds) pp517; Cosmic String-Loops and
galaxy formation – Angular Momentum and The Hubble Sequence – Piers Corbyn (then at Queen Mary
College London)
1986 Italian Physical Society, Cosmologia Di Gamow, Proc of Enrico Fermi International School of
Physics 1982 pp231; A Virial Approach to the Relation between the Cosmological Density Parameter R#
and the Microwave background Temperature To. by P R Corbyn & J E Beckman (work was by Piers,
John Beckman was supervisor and advisor at dept of Physics Queen Mary College London. Through this
work Piers became acquainted with various researchers including Professor Martin Rees whose advise on
neutrino temperatures is acknowledged in the paper.}
Peer-reviewed book contributions and invited Presentations at major events on Sun-Earth
Relations; Solar causes of Climate Change and Long range weather forecasting, are listed below
[NB Insurance company, Risk analysis, business in farming and Energy industry etc and more regular / shorter
University presentations or Posters contributions such as at University of Kent, University College London,
Florence and Royal Meteorological Society (eg in 1999/2000) at Imperial College and at Cambridge; not
listed. Presentations at Seminars involving Intellectual property of Solar Weather Technique are also
excluded:
1995 Breakthroughs in Long Range forecasting – The New meteorology of The Solar Weather technique –
Piers Corbyn presented at ecam95 – European Conference on Applications of Meteorology Toulouse
France (events later televised on QED 1996)
1996 4th Oct A QED (BBC 1) TV programme about Piers Corbyn & Weather Action – 7 million viewers.
1996 Two papers in The Global Warming Debate Book by The European Science and Environment
Forum – (editorial committee: Dr John Emsley, Roger Bate, Prof Dr Ftis Bottcher)
CO2 fluctuations resulting from climate Change Piers Corbyn pages 71-77.
What Is Global temperature? The Inadequacy of Estimation Methods Piers Corbyn & Monoucher
Golipour pages 80-86
.1997 Three papers:
IAGA (1997) 8th Scientific Assembly of International Association of Geomagnetism and Aeronomy,
Uppsala, Sweden, August 4-15th Corbyn, P & Golipour, M, ‘A Solar Based Alternative to Theories of
Global warming’, IAGA Uppsala 1997 sessions 2.15/3. 13.
1997 3rd European Conference of Applications of Meteorology Lindau Sept 1997. The Solar Weather
Technique, a breakthrough in Long Range Forecasting’, Corbyn, P, Bamsi-Yazdi, K & Golipour, M.
1997 Climate Changes Symposium, Bonn 10-11 Nov 1997: Piers Corbyn, A (Solar-based) New
Alternative to theories Of global Warming: http://www.tmgnow.com/repository/global/corbyn1.html
2004 Two major conference presentations.
2004 Feb A Guest speaker at the Global Oil Summit Houston Texas;
2004 July Russian Academy of Sciences International Forum on Climate Change – presentation and
circulated paper – invited by the President of Russia’s Scientific Adviser Andrei Illarianov.
2005 Feb Invited presentation at Institute Of Physics, London.
2006 Two major conferences.
2006 June. Future Trends Forum Madrid.
2006 Sept Stockholm. Climate Change Symposium.
2007 Mar 4 Appeared in Martin Durkin’s groundbreaking Great Global Warming Swindle Chan 4 TV.
2007 June 7th Panellist along with Professor Richard Lindzen at Climate Change Seminar Institute Of
Physics London. (Piers’ presentation for this event – with updates – is available)
2007 August and Autumn wrote to Gordon Brown re The Summer Floods and consequently on request
ubmitted evidence to the Government’s Flood Review.
2007 27th July Guest speaker at the Imperial College Students Union Presidents dinner marking the
centenary year of Imperial College Union
2008 17th Jan Piers Corbyn awarded the AMEME Hopley Shield 2008 speaking on
Is it the Sun or Is it you? – ‘Global warming’ debate and Long range weather forecasting
Minerals Engineering Society – at Willesley Park Golf Club, Ashby-de-la-Zouch, Leicestershire.
This prestigious annual award was started by what was then the Association of Mining Electrical and
Mechanical Engineers in 1975.
2008 March 2-4th Manhattan New York International Climate Change conference – Presentation
entitled ‘What Does and Does Not Cause climate Change’. Piers is a signatory of The Manhattan
Declaration which was agreed at that conference.
2008 April BBC FOCUS magazine – science & technology monthly – carries a glossy feature on Piers
Corbyn and Weather Action pages 68 to 72, by Stuart Clark.
2008 April 14th One of ‘Gang of 4’ signatories to a direct challenge to the UN Climate change
Committee (IPCC) to produce evidence from the available data for their theories.
Citations.
Piers Corbyns work on weather and solar activity – weather relations physics are cited in many places.
Two books of note being:
Nigel Calder, The Manic Sun Pilkington Press 1997;
Harry Thompson, This Thing Of Darkness (short listed for Booker prize), Authors postscript page 734.
Unquote.
So one of his many weather forecasts may not have been very accurate. And his name is not on the Harvard University list of astrophysicists. But most of his weather forecasts are accurate, they are far better that the predictions from the MET Office with their expensive supercomputer. When Piers’ weather forecasts would be bad, his subscribers would very soon stop buying them. The idea that they would still go on paying for bad predictions out of cognitive dissonance, not willing to admit they made a mistake, is not right. People will often defend wrong choices they made in the past for the reason you mentioned, but when they have to go on paying for something that is not good, it is a different story. Piers’ customers are no fools (as you called them), if Piers would make wrong forecasts time after time (like the MET Office is doing), they would soon stop paying him.
And about your link to the Harvard University: Their library is full of bogus studies about man-made global warming. Since the anthropogenic global warming theory became the “polical correct science (term invented by Lenin), their science is corrupted and studies of crtical scientists are banned. It is wrong to measure the scientific skills of (astro)physicists by consulting the Harvard list, because it has a politically determined bias for studies of authors that do not contradict the political correct science. Critics are left out, but that doesn’t mean that they are bad scientists.

Argiris Diamantis says:
August 17, 2013 at 11:14 amAnd his name is not on the Harvard University list of astrophysicists.
This is Harvard’s list. ADS is a list of scientific papers and citations to them published in the scientific literature. Piers does not appear. Granted that ADS does not have 100% coverage [there are always the odd obscure journals that could have been missed], perhaps you could provide a link [with journal, volume, page nr] to one [or better: more] of Pier’s scientific, peer-reviewed papers.

kadaka (KD Knoebel) says:
August 17, 2013 at 11:25 amWhat is that large “crease line” in the upper left section?
A flaw in the instrument, that has recently developed. I don’t know the precise cause, probably some mechanical or thermal defect [crack, …]. Space is a harsh environment.

They say the temp. trend in the face of a grand solar minimum will be +0.10c +/- .05c per decade from 2020-2040.That [will] be flat out WRONG, since the temperature trend will be down prior to 2020, and should continue to at least until 2040.

They say what they say because they want to push their soon to be obsolete AGW theory ahead.
Gerald Meehl,Marsh and company are entrenched in [their] theory of AGW, and will go to any lengths to prove what they say is right , even in the face of present day realities showing them to be wrong on every single prediction they have made thus far.

Salvatore Del Prete says:
August 17, 2013 at 11:32 amThat will be flat out WRONG, since the temperature trend will be down prior to 2020
too many ‘will be’s. You have no clue as to what ‘will be’. Just wishful, unfounded thinking.

What is not understood is the field of climate change is not based on objective data,instead they have resorted to the manipulation of data, to ignore data or change data, that will not support their notions of AGW.

In addition they make it (mainstream) very hard for the many scientist who have a [completely] different view on climate change to have their thoughts expressed. Anotherwords they black ball [dissenting] views. This is why people like Piers have limited publications and citations.

While institutions like the Weather Channel,and company can readily spread their false views.

kadaka (KD Knoebel) says:
August 17, 2013 at 11:25 amWhat is that large “crease line” in the upper left section?
A flaw in the instrument, that has recently developed. I don’t know the precise cause, probably some mechanical or thermal defect [crack, …]. Space is a harsh environment.
The crack[?] began to develop in March 2012 and has gotten worse ever since:

kadaka (KD Knoebel) says:
August 17, 2013 at 11:43 amAnd SDO’s replacement will be launched and in position by when?
none anticipated nor scheduled. But it is only one sensor that is affected on SDO, so the damage is minor and we can live with it [perhaps even correct for it].

Salvatore Del Prete says:
August 17, 2013 at 11:45 amThis is why people like Piers have limited publications and citations.
Correction: not ‘limited’, but ‘none’. The real reason for this is not a word-wide conspiracy, but that Piers have not published anything, nor passed peer reviews. For good reason: he does not want to give away his ‘secret sauce’.

There’s nothing there: no dust to speak of, no gasses, no radiation, no wind, no rain, no lightening strikes or power failures or earthquakes, actually: no pressures on anything at all not even any temperature! World’s (well, out-of-this world’s) most perfect pristine uncontaminated environment anywhere! Not even any people to walk around bumping things or screwing the lab environment up with all their messy and expensive and time-consuming maintenance shutdowns and calibration intervals.

Dr S, I am an engineer, with engineering level of understanding into physics. I have an interest in solar physics, mostly for better understanding its role in climate. Any suggestions on a website or text book for beginners?

high energy SW (lowest wave length)
changes oxygen into ozone, water into peroxide, etc (TOA)
you try and do that in a lab?
hence a quiet sun means more of that type of energy coming down
Paradoxically, earth reacts by producing more ozone, peroxides, nitrous oxides, etc TOA<
hence we are globally cooling….

Climate consist much more then just cycles, one can not extrapolate the climate based on cycles. Past history shows this clearly to be the case,if one goes back far enough..

Thresholds are out there that has caused the climate to change abruptly from time to time and in a dramatic fashion which will not allow the climate to fit into some neat cycle.Two recent examples are the 8200 year cold period and the Younga Dryas cold period.

Until one can explain the reasons for the causes of abrupt dramatic climate changes in the past (like in the above) any climate forecast for the future based on just climate cycles is not going to work out.
There are too many unknowns and the phasing of the items that control the climate need to be known as well as the duration of time of the phasing and the degree/direction of magnitude change of the items that are phasing that control the climate undertake.

To make matters worse does the phasing evenually lead to a climatic threshold being reached.

The phasing is toward a cooling trend starting around now and continuing at least to 2040, the question is what will be the character of the cooling trend. Will it be gradual or abrupt with spurts then a leveling off etc etc.

Henry, I have to differ with you on cycles per say ,it is just NOT that easy.

Your climatic cycle theory does not hold up if you review all the climate fluctuations,different climate fluctuations, degree of magntiude change and duration of time of all the climate fluctuations going back say to the last glacial maximum some 20,000 years ago.

Cycles can’t reconcile a period like the Younga Dryas, followed by extreme sudden warming , or the 8200 year ago cold period for example.

Thresholds are out there which can throw a non linear system such as the climate into impossible predictable results, even when the same forcings are applied, due to the state of the climate to begin with, the location of the forcings, duration of time and degree of magnitude of the forcings.

It can be generalized(like we know there is an extreme likelyhood of a temp. decline going forward) but no one is going to get the details as far as the extent or duration of time or the degree of magnitude of the climate change.
Maybe the climate shifts to another climate regime ,maybe it doesn’t.

RACookPE1978 says:
August 17, 2013 at 12:04 pmHow could “space” be a harsh environment?
Ultraviolet light from the sun is harsh. The temperature difference between being in the Sun and in the shade is harsh.

Salvatore Del Prete says:
August 17, 2013 at 12:24 pmThe reason being the the so called establishment , does not want to give equal playing time, or visibility to anyone that goes against their sacred AGW theory.
Wrong, see for example the papers by Scafetta. The real criteria is whether the paper is written to a certain standard.

Salvatore Del Prete says:
August 17, 2013 at 12:28 pmThe phasing is toward a cooling trend starting around now and continuing at least to 2040
Groundless assertion.

From the earlier graph you can see that we have been cooling globally since at least 2002
but this cooling is not the same on each place.
Washington DC got warmer as did some places in Norway, since 2000
this means that on the other side it got cooler:
as reported from Canada and Alaska

I remember that in one of my earlier encounters with Leif he called the paper from William Arnold “On the Special Theory of Order”, 1985

“junk”

Now, at the end of my investigations
-I figured everything out on my own –
I found that WIlliam Arnold was right on almost everything he said.
He just had the time a bit wrong,
alas he did not have my data.

I hope one day Leif will come out of the closet and realize that it is indeed the planets that trigger the dynamo inside the sun into two different modes (low spots/high spots)

kadaka (KD Knoebel) says:
August 17, 2013 at 2:00 pmNow that the flaw is severe enough to notice on the small graphics, it will be distracting.
Humans are very good at adapting to changing circumstances.

I keep hearing a background echoing, ” it is not a binary system.”
No, it is not a binary system.

The Earth system is coupled to and influenced by the solar system. The solar system is coupled to and influenced by the Local Interstellar System.
And….that knowledge base is growing in leaps and bounds.

PROBING OUR HELIOSPHERIC HISTORY II
Constructing A Density Profile of the LISM in the Sun’s Rearview Mirror
Katherine I. Wyman1, Seth Redfield2http://hea-www.cfa.harvard.edu/~kwyman/pdfs/poster12.pdf
Abstract
..This combination of cloud properties allows us to derive a volume density profile of the ISM in the Sun’s “rear-view mirror,” which represents one plausible record of actual
ISM encounters for the Sun. We also make use of empirical relations to determine the effect these clouds would have on the historical heliosphere. Our analysis suggests
that within the last 10 million years, if the Sun encountered a cloud with the same properties as we have detected along the solar historical trajectory, the Sun’s termination
shock would have resided inside the orbit of Uranus, with a GCR flux at Earth an order of magnitude greater than it is currently….

Probing our Heliospheric History I: High-Resolution Observations of NaI and CaII Along the Solar Historical Trajectory.
Wyman and Redfieldhttp://arxiv.org/pdf/1307.2899.pdf
I’ll be back..81 pages where did I get this one.

Instead of climate change or global warming, perhaps it should be called,
EARTH’s SYSTEM CHANGES: Natural and Man Made changes and impacts

@ HenryP
The Uranus “Switch” factor in the above abstract? Just thinkin about that the other day ago. My thoughts are in relationship to the possibility of instability in the region of Uranus and Neptune. As well as their relationship proximity with the Kuiper belt.

Carla says:
August 17, 2013 at 2:42 pm
‘The solar system is coupled to and influenced by the Local Interstellar System.
That influence does not extend significantly to the inner solar system because the solar wind blows outwards a

no, it seems the sun operates like a solenoid, the switch is triggered by the planets (mainly saturn and uranus) the slight change within TSI that follows is what causes a change in reactions TOA (formation of ozone, peroxides, etc) and all of this then causes a weather cycle, as less sunshine is deflected during the 44 years of warming, and more sunshine is deflected to space during the subsequent 44 years of the cooling period.. It is predominantly saturn and uranus working together that throw the switch, other planets may enhance or slow the switch occurring, hence the variation within the Hale Nicholson 22 year solar cycle.
I figured this all out by starting to look at a sample of 47 weather stations, carefully selected to ensure global representation, and analysing all daily temp. data:http://blogs.24.com/henryp/2013/02/21/henrys-pool-tables-on-global-warmingcooling/
& looking at the speed of warming/cooling:http://blogs.24.com/henryp/2012/10/02/best-sine-wave-fit-for-the-drop-in-global-maximum-temperatures/
In hindsight, all things considered, notwithstanding Leif,and except maybe for the help of a few people here from WUWT, I regard my own final report as somewhat of a miracle…

PROBING OUR HELIOSPHERIC HISTORY II
Constructing A Density Profile of the LISM in the Sun’s Rearview Mirror
Katherine I. Wyman1, Seth Redfield2http://hea-www.cfa.harvard.edu/~kwyman/pdfs/poster12.pdf
Abstract
…Our analysis suggests
that within the last 10 million years, if the Sun encountered a cloud with the same properties as we have detected along the solar historical trajectory,
the Sun’s termination shock would have resided inside the orbit of Uranus,
with a GCR flux at Earth an order of magnitude greater than it is currently….

@HenryP, you do know that there are changes in the interstellar background that can and do influence the the heliosphere, which consequently influence solar cycle and climate on all planets, don’t you? The example in the pdf presentation above is quite real. That we are looking backwards along the heliospheres trajectory is quite cool. It is looking like this magnetic ROTATING super shell is about 120pc long. The filamentry region along the edge, (120 pc behind us maybe partly due to rotation)
They can see the next cloud in front of us, G cloud, and between us and G is a filamentary region.. which maybe the other end of Loop 1. We are near the EDGE NOW HenryP.
They have used old and new sight lines in the current study. Old sight lines seem to confirm new sight lines. Small variations are seen. But hey if we are part of a rotating, magnetic slab there will be variations.

Except, Dr. S. the smaller scale structures that are located inside this magnetic super shell. (Loop 1) are difficult to see in the downwind direction. (the direction of the heliotail)
The smaller scale stuctures are difficult because of highly ionized solar exhaust pipe wake. And they know it. See comments below on the need for uv spectroscopy.

Probing our Heliospheric History I: High-Resolution Observations of NaI and CaII
Along the Solar Historical Trajectory.
Wyman and Redfieldhttp://arxiv.org/pdf/1307.2899.pdf
…Unfortunately, Ca II
and Na I are largely insensitive to the warm, partially ionized clouds that are known to
reside within the Local Bubble, which require UV spectroscopic observations (Frisch et al.
2011)….

…In the context of reconstructing the ISM along
the historical solar trajectory, this small-scale structure makes it very difficult to identify
anything other than the largest structures. However, it motivates even more strongly the
need to understand the interaction between stars and the ISM through which they are
passing because the abundance of small-scale structures implies that dramatic changes in
the properties of our surrounding ISM are a common occurrence….

…4. Conclusions
3. The nearest significant ISM absorber has a velocity of 23 km s−1 and is located at
120 pc, which is consistent with the edge of the Local Bubble. This interstellar
material would have been encountered by the Sun 10 Myr ago. However, we know
that significant interstellar material resides within this volume, including the LIC,
which defines the current structure of the heliosphere. These optical transitions are
simply not sensitive enough to probe the very closest material, and therefore, to
measure the ISM that the Sun encountered within the last few million years, we need
spectroscopic observations in the UV.
4. Na I and Ca II do not seem to be identically distributed in interstellar clouds, as
indicated by the inconsistency of the line widths, namely that b Ca > b Na, despite the
fact that calcium has a higher atomic weight. Nonetheless, the two ions do appear
to be correlated, given the similarity in velocity structure and therefore, are likely
constituents in related but distinct structures within a single ISM cloud complex,
with Ca II tracing warm (8000 K) gas and Na I tracing cold (<3000 K) gas..

Dog gone it Dr. S.
..there could be a consistent distribution of smaller scale filamentary regions.
Like at around 60 to 90 years, But we can’t even see them.
The reason I think I am seeing more filamentary regions is from this comment:

…the abundance of small-scale structures implies that dramatic changes in
the properties of our surrounding ISM are a common occurrence..

the Colliding of even a small scale structures would produce small scale filamentary regions..
100 to 500 AU size smaller scale structure..

Carla says:
August 18, 2013 at 8:28 amthe Colliding of even a small scale structures would produce small scale filamentary regions..
But, they would no significant influence on solar activity because of the supersonic solar wind.such filaments in our neighborhood would cause variations in cosmic ray intensity across the sky and none are observed.

Have you heard one of the latest about the CURRENT location of Voyager 1?
They think it is inside a “magnetic highway.”
There is more to the story than jovian planets in orbit around their star. They seem to make it more complicated in the planetary environment.
Do watch for direct reconnection in the inner MOST planets that are located within 1 AU, the halo region? I mean for additional flux enhancements to the region.

If I was really good at theorizing,
We might posit as to the hemispheric asymmetry in the sunspots of sunspot cycles just by positioning the distribution of cloud mass around the bubble above or below the magnetic equator in 60 to 90 year overturn intervals..
But this may get me more trouble than I would like to even consider. So.. strike that..or something..

represent almost all of my data on maximum temps. Note that an a-c curve consists of 4 quadrants, for each full wave. In my best fit, I saw that each quadrant or half oscillation has a time span of about 22 years, on average. In the paper from that I quoted from William Arnold, he suggests that it is mainly the position of the two planets Saturn and Uranus that can be directly linked to the 22 year solar cycle. I looked at this again. At first the dates he gave did not make sense to me. Until I put them next to one another

Then I put the dates of the various positions of Uranus and Saturn next to it:

1) we had/have Saturn synodical with Uranus (i.e. in line with each other)

1897, 1942, 1988, 2032

2) we had complete 180 degrees opposition between Saturn and Uranus

1919, 1965, 2009,

In all 7 of my own results & projections, there is an exact 7 or 8 years delay, before “the push/pull ” occurs, that switches the dynamo inside the sun, changing the sign….from warming to cooling or vice versa, every 44 years!!!! Conceivably the gravitational pull of these two planets has some special lob sided character, causing the actual switch. Perhaps Uranus’ apparent side ward motion (inclination of equator by 98 degrees) works like a push-pull trigger. Either way, there is a clear correlation with my a-c curve.. Other synodical cycles of planets probably have some interference as well either delaying or extending the normal cycle time a little bit. So it appears William Arnold’s report was right after all….(“On the Special Theory of Order”, 1985).

Since we had the last opposition 2009, we will reach the bottom turning point 2016.
From 2016 we will still have about 5 years until the droughts on the Great Plains start.

Loop 1 shell is a magnetized, rotating slab, containing clouds of various sizes and density’s with filamentary regions large and small. East is positive and West negative along the rotation path.

The heliosphere is free falling in a spiral type pattern head long into and through the rotating magnetic slab.

You can’t see that the motion of both changes the angle at which the two fields IMF and ISMF couple. Changes in the ISMF magnetic pressure above or below the IMF magnetic equator, could be……. related to hemispheric asymmetry in sunpots and sunspot cycle.

I was talking about periodic, natural occurring weather cycles
…nothing chaotic….
the key was to figure out what throws the switch?
—
You are only using a portion of one interglacial period. The scale is bigger than orbiting jovian planets.
And your theory happens to coincide with the heliospheric bubble, that your planets are in, gets squashed by interstellar pressure changes.. there is an asymmetry in the heliospheric nose and similar asymmetry in the heliotail. Polar fields are being squashed.

lsvalgaard says:
August 18, 2013 at 9:11 am
Carla says:
August 18, 2013 at 9:05 am
If I was really good at theorizing, We might posit as to the hemispheric asymmetry …
‘positing’ is not science. there has to be a reason for something, a worked out numerical theory based on physical theory and all the rest.
++++++++++
Leif: You are always so precise, that I have to jump in here to help.
Positing is what leads to a hypothesis which is the starting point in the scientific method. So I would say that Carla is correct in the way she uses “Positing”.

For example, let’s go back in time. One posits that something causes an apple to fall from the tree. This started the process of identifying gravity which did not exist as a word back then. There was no numerical proof, but there was a high level of probability that the apple will always fall once its connection to the tree is broken. Even though someone may not have calculated or worked out the numerical theory, it could be relied upon that on Earth, the apple would consistently fall to the ground.
The apple would fall even prior to Newton taking notice. I am quite certain that people long before Newton shook trees to get apples down, even though it could be said that these people had no working knowledge of gravity. These non scientists of yesteryear knew that they could rely on the knowledge that shaking trees released apples to within their reach. :)

It was positing that led to the scientific discovery of gravity as we numerically define it as 9.8 meters per second per second. Actually, I think it was 32 feet per second per second before it was in metric since Sir Issac was a Brit.

Mario Lento says:
August 18, 2013 at 10:51 amPositing is what leads to a hypothesis which is the starting point in the scientific method. So I would say that Carla is correct in the way she uses “Positing”.
For example, let’s go back in time. One posits that something causes an apple to fall from the tree. This started the process of identifying gravity which did not exist as a word back then.

I don’t think you are helpful with this. Newton’s primary contribution was not the hypothesis of gravitational interaction that explains celestial and terrestrial motion, but the way he looked at the problem, finding a mathematical description of the phenomenon that allowed the interaction to be expressed numerically. Newton says himself “I make no hypothesis”.

@carla
the graph you show clearly shows one whole oscillation, of the relevant sine wave, from 1972-2016 (44 years). It means the (current) slump will continue (until 2016). Only after the switch has occurred (after 2016) can a new oscillation start, which would in fact be a mirror image of the previous oscillation, if you were to project into future, until 2060.
You understand?

Leif: You are so smart, that perhaps again I am confused in my back and forth with you. Until I am not confused, I think my point was cogent. Though Newton says he makes no hypothesis, that phase had to occur (maybe before him) so that he could get to the work of putting numbers to the repeatable observations.

Do you maintain that “positing” is not part of the scientific method because someone says that Newton says he did not make a hypothesis? Come on now. This should not be so difficult ;)

Mario Lento says:
August 18, 2013 at 11:33 ambecause someone says that Newton says he did not make a hypothesis?
Not just ‘someone’. Newton said that he makes no hypothesis. His theory of gravitation is a description of gravity using mathematics.

Yes Leif: Newton maintained a clear demarcation between theories that were supported by experimental results and hypotheses that were merely unsupported speculations. I get it. So I agree with you that his certainty allowed him to skip past making a hypothesis since he already had made empirical observations. But, this is just semantics. Before the empirical data, gravity still existed whether or not there was observation of gravity. His empirical observations did not happen first, they happened after apples fell from trees. That does not discount that positing is part of the scientific process right? He just went through this in his mind, so the hypothesis occurred in his mind in perhaps a swift moment for him. He had to posit that the apple falls because of some force… then he identified the force and it was good. It was, let us say, gravity. Now onto the spectrum of what makes light appear white.

August 18, 2013 at 10:51 am
—
Thanks Mario, but the apple hit the ground. The heliosphere bubble is free falling into a spiral motion creating a bit of vortex. This may appley or exert some gravitational influence on its constituent parties involved.

Yes HenryP. see what your saying but the first cause is where we differ. Planets are the mirror image of the solar motion through interstellar space.

lsvalgaard says:
August 18, 2013 at 11:41 am
Mario Lento says:
August 18, 2013 at 11:33 am
because someone says that Newton says he did not make a hypothesis?
Not just ‘someone’. Newton said that he makes no hypothesis. His theory of gravitation is a description of gravity using mathematics.
++++++++++
Yes – I was making a point that even you Leif, did not hear or see him write down the statement hundreds of years ago. You heard it or read it from someone who printed or posted that he wrote that he made no hypothesis… And we can agree that it’s “probably” not a contentious point. It is well known as you point out that he made this claim… and the meaning to me is subjective… since at some point he had to posit the thought, even if only to himself. Somewhere there was some positing going on –even if he did not say or proclaim a posit, there was no theory until evidence was collected and mathematical relationships were arranged to claim the theory.

August 18, 2013 at 10:51 am
—
Thanks Mario, but the apple hit the ground. The heliosphere bubble is free falling into a spiral motion creating a bit of vortex. This may appley or exert some gravitational influence on its constituent parties involved.
+++++
The only point I made (at least that was my intent) was to suggest that positing must occur before we can arrive at a theory. Timescales must be considered. So even if the posit was for a mere few milliseconds, there had to be a posit before the theory. And therefore, I claim it is nonsensical (to me) that positing is not part of the scientific method.

Do I think I can hold a candle to Leif? No… but I can still feel comfy enough to engage in skeptical debate on words used. I posit that I am not being disrespectful here, but I need to gather the data to make sure I am not being disrespectful… :)

Mario Lento says:
August 18, 2013 at 12:02 pmeven you Leif, did not hear or see him write down the statement hundreds of years ago. You heard it or read it from someone who printed or posted that he wrote that he made no hypothesis…
I’m holding in my hands his book ‘The Principia [2nd edition – General Scholium]’ and in it he wrote ‘hypothesis non fingo’. One would presume that he read [from the printed page] what he wrote and agreed with what he wrote [and what was printed], so that it is should correct to state that Newton actually said that and meant what he said.
As far as I know the story with the apple is that it was clear to Newton that an apple falling from a tree would be accelerated as it fell [Galileo had shown that falling bodies accelerate]. Now, so the story goes, Newton thought about an apple falling from a tree twice as tall. It would still be accelerated [and even more], then about a still higher tree, and so on, imagining a tree extending all the way to the Moon, the apple would still be falling, so why not the Moon itself. Upon calculating the acceleration Newton found that math didn’t work out and abandoned the idea. It turned out that the distance to the Moon was not well known at the time. When later an improved distance became available, Newton repeated the calculation and this time the numbers came out right, so Newton did now return to the matter of developing his theory for gravity.
The standard definition of the verb ‘posit’ is: “Assume as a fact as a basis for an argument”. I have myself made several scientific discoveries and never felt that I posited anything. What is missing from Carla’s positing is the ‘argument’ part. So, she can posit and it would be science if it is followed by a physics-based argument yielding numbers that can be compared with observations, otherwise it is just assertion.

Newton’s actual scientific method is still somewhat controversial among historians of science, but he is widely suspected of hiding the truth in order to protect or project priority in discoveries & inventions.

What Sir Isaac actually wrote in the essay, General Scholium, appended to the second (1713) edition of the Principia, was, “Hypotheses non fingo”, Latin for “I feign (frame or contrive) no hypotheses”.

The passage containing this famous remark was translated in 1999 by Cohen & Whitman as:

“I have not as yet been able to discover the reason for these properties of gravity from phenomena, and I do not feign hypotheses. For whatever is not deduced from the phenomena must be called a hypothesis; and hypotheses, whether metaphysical or physical, or based on occult qualities, or mechanical, have no place in experimental philosophy. In this philosophy particular propositions are inferred from the phenomena, and afterwards rendered general by induction.”

Some if not most students of Newton today think that he did not conceive of universal gravitation to its fullest extent in 1666, inspired by a falling apple, as later described by himself & to his friend, Mint colleague & nephew-in-law, John Conduitt.

Others think that he did in fact have the insight of universal gravitation in 1666 & made a first attempt at the moon test, the results of which didn’t quite jibe with observations, because of an insufficiently accurate (or precise) estimate of Earth’s radius.

IMO, he did in fact hypothesize, ie make a WAG or reasonable assumption, then spent years trying to support it with observations & math. The Principia itself arose out of his assertion to Halley that he had already shown that the orbit of planets must be elliptical, based upon the inverse square relationship, but had mislaid the work.

And to HenryP., do you understand the many implications of having the heliosphere’s “termination shock” inside Uranus orbit? Talk about your geomagnetic jerks. Oh my.. In other time periods does it (termination shock) just come in close to Uranus orbit? We know that heliospheric boundaries vary and change on all time scales.

PROBING OUR HELIOSPHERIC HISTORY II
Constructing A Density Profile of the LISM in the Sun’s Rearview Mirror
Katherine I. Wyman1, Seth Redfield2http://hea-www.cfa.harvard.edu/~kwyman/pdfs/poster12.pdf
Abstract
…Our analysis suggests
that within the last 10 million years, if the Sun encountered a cloud with the same properties as we have detected along the solar historical trajectory,
the Sun’s termination shock would have resided inside the orbit of Uranus,
with a GCR flux at Earth an order of magnitude greater than it is currently….

Carla says:
August 18, 2013 at 1:02 pmthe Sun’s termination shock would have resided inside the orbit of Uranus,
with a GCR flux at Earth an order of magnitude greater than it is currently….
Two things wrong with this:
1) this may have happened on time scales on millions or billions of years. ain’t happening now, so of no interest
2) There is no good evidence that cosmic rays have anything to do with the climate not with paleo-climate.

Carla says:
August 18, 2013 at 1:02 pm
the Sun’s termination shock would have resided inside the orbit of Uranus,
with a GCR flux at Earth an order of magnitude greater than it is currently….
Two things wrong with this:
1) this may have happened on time scales on millions or billions of years. ain’t happening now, so of no interest
—

Yet the solar cycle continues to wax and wane like its riding and undulating, co mixing WAVE.
Sometimes it wanes for longer periods and sometimes shorter. And that is a good point for someone looking for root causes in solar cycle variations.
The smaller background structures Dr. S., are in abundance so much so that it is producing a foreground, making it only possible to see the outline of your once in a while (millions of years) dealeo.
I think you know that in the extreme case that it would be more than just cosmic ray flux encroaching on the planetary systems. Accretion .. the ‘A’ word.

Carla says:
August 18, 2013 at 1:43 pmI think you know that in the extreme case that it would be more than just cosmic ray flux encroaching on the planetary systems. Accretion .. the ‘A’ word.
First, we are not having an extreme case now, and second, the relevant ‘accretion’ has no effect on anything.

Sorry Dr. S. your in a rotating magnetic shell, with a current sheet, it is wavy and carrying sign.
Now put a background within your rotating magnetic shell, fill it with cloudlets and filamentary structures. Picture a scale larger than the suns wavy current sheet, producing undulating waves. This is what the sun’s itsy, bitsy current sheet gets to couple with. Itsy, bitsy by comparison.

Up and down it wobbles that huge scale rotating magnetic current sheet.
Maybe I should posit that the up and down periodicity of the rotating magnetic sheet is at around 60 to 90 years.
I would say the door is still open at to what influences solar cycle like behavior. These days we are starting to see more of the different types of astrospheres in our galaxy. This should be quite helpful..

As the twin Voyager spacecraft approach the boundary of the heliosphere, they continue returning new and unexplained measurements of the solar wind (SW) protons, energetic particles, and magnetic field that often differ markedly between the two spacecraft.
Our recent studies show that time-dependent effects play a crucial role in understanding and interpreting the observational data. Since the SW is unsteady on many different time scales, its interaction with the local interstellar medium (LISM) should reflect the solar rotation and cycle, as well as merged interplanetary disturbances. Even a simplified solar cycle model allowed us to predict in 2009 the possibility of a negative radial velocity component in the SW as the heliopause is approached.
Further analysis shows a nearly vanishing latitudinal velocity component, while the longitudinal component becomes comparable substantial.
Here we discuss the change of the magnetic field and plasma properties across the heliopause, which is important for the identification of its spacecraft crossing. We discuss the effects of heliopause instabilities and corotating interaction regions, and demonstrate that Voyagers are unlikely to see a sharp boundary between the SW and the LISM, but rather a mixing layer of varying width.

Carla says:
August 18, 2013 at 2:36 pmThis is what the sun’s itsy, bitsy current sheet gets to couple with. Itsy, bitsy by comparison.
It doesn’t matter, as none of that makes it upstream to the Sun, it is like the Mississippi River flowing into the Gulf. The waves out there don’t make it to the headwaters of the river.

We investigate the effects of the 11 year solar cycle and 25 day rotation period of the Sun on the interaction of the solar wind (SW) with the local interstellar medium (LISM).
Our models take into account the partially ionized character of the LISM and include
momentum and energy transfer between the ionized and neutral components.
We assume that the interstellar magnetic field vector belongs to the hydrogen deflection plane as
discovered in the SOHO SWAN experiment. This plane is inclined at an angle of about 60◦ toward the ecliptic plane of the Sun, as suggested in recent publications relating the
local interstellar cloud properties to the radio emission observed by Voyager 1.
It is assumed that the latitudinal extent of the boundary between the slow
and fast SW regions, as well as the angle between the Sun’s rotation and magnetic-dipole axes, are periodic functions of time, while the polarity of the
interstellar magnetic field changes sign every 11 years at the solar
maximum. The global variation of the SW–LISM interaction pattern, the excursions of the termination shock and the heliopause, and parameter distributions in certain directions are investigated. The analysis of the behavior of the wavy heliospheric current sheet
in the supersonic SW region shows the importance of neutral atoms on its dynamics.

No don’t be taken back by all this.. the description of the HCS during solar activity cycle is quite good, in this article.. more to follow from the introduction..

Carla says:
August 18, 2013 at 5:27 pmMaybe we need more coupling examples.. To help us understand this vast interaction region that couples the IMF to the ISMF.
What you need to understand is the coupling takes place at the interface between the two media and does not influence the Sun. BTW, I was one of the discoverers of the HCS and especially of its importance for modulating cosmic rays, so I do know what I’m talking about.

THREE-DIMENSIONAL FEATURES OF THE OUTER HELIOSPHERE DUE TO COUPLING BETWEEN THE
INTERSTELLAR AND INTERPLANETARY MAGNETIC FIELDS. III. THE EFFECTS OF SOLAR ROTATION
AND ACTIVITY CYCLE

http://iopscience.iop.org/0004-637X/696/2/1478/pdf/0004-637X_696_2_1478.pdf
from the intro
…The boundary is a function of time within a solar activity period. Second, t
he Sun’s rotation and magnetic-dipole axes never coincide. For this reason,
the heliospheric current sheet (HCS), which divides the SW into regions of opposite
IMF polarity, has a complicated wavy shape. The IMF polarity changes related
to a 25 day solar rotation period were first identified from IMP-1 observations
by Ness & Wilcox (1964, 1965). Definitive evidence of the inclined HCS
(with dependence on the heliographic latitude) was provided by Pioneer 11
(Smith 1978).
An extensive analysis of the HCS behavior at distances covered by
the Ulysses trajectory was undertaken by Smith (2001). It was shown
that at 1 AU the width of the HCS is extremely small (∼10,000 km)
as compared with distances characteristic for the heliospheric interface.
The HCS is a little like a magnetic equator. Extrapolated back to the
Sun, especially during solar minimum, the HCS corresponds to the lower-latitude
streamer belt. The HCS is surrounded by an approximately 30 times thicker
heliospheric plasma sheet (HPS), i.e., about 0.002 AU.
Both the HCS and HPS scale thicknesses are far too small to be modeled
globally even with modern supercomputers and adaptive mesh refinement (AMR)
techniques, if we perform calculations in a region of about 103 AU size,
which is needed to model the SW–LISM interaction.
As shown by Winterhalter et al. (1994), the change in the magnetic field direction
to an opposite across the HCS does not imply that the IMF vanishes.
That is, the magnetic field vector rotates within the HCS, and the latter can be marginally interpreted as an Alfv´en discontinuity. In any event, the investigation
of the HCS behavior in this paper is based on the assumption that the effect
of the HCS smearing due to numerical dissipation can be disregarded. The accuracy
of this assumption will be clear from our results.
If the angle α between the Sun’s rotation and magnetic axes is a known function of time,
while the region swept out by the HCS is occupied by a radially expanding SW
with zero latitudinal and longitudinal velocity components, simple geometrical
considerations allow us to derive approximate formulae for the HCS location
as a function of time at different heliocentric distances…

Carla says:
August 18, 2013 at 5:27 pmTHREE-DIMENSIONAL FEATURES OF THE OUTER HELIOSPHERE DUE TO COUPLING BETWEEN THE INTERSTELLAR AND INTERPLANETARY MAGNETIC FIELDS. III.
THE EFFECTS OF SOLAR ROTATION AND ACTIVITY CYCLE
Here is your problem: you misread the little word ‘OF’ and think it is ‘ON’ and therefore get direction of causality reversed.

Carla says:
August 18, 2013 at 5:39 pm…The boundary is a function of time within a solar activity period. Second, the Sun’s rotation and magnetic-dipole axes never coincide. For this reason, the heliospheric current sheet (HCS), which divides the SW into regions of opposite IMF polarity, has a complicated wavy shape.
All that was discovered and explained by us more than 35 years ago.

lsvalgaard says:
August 18, 2013 at 5:34 pm
Carla says:
August 18, 2013 at 5:27 pm
Maybe we need more coupling examples.. To help us understand this vast interaction region that couples the IMF to the ISMF.

..BTW, I was one of the discoverers of the HCS and especially of its importance for modulating cosmic rays, so I do know what I’m talking about.
—

Yes, I know, you know, what it is you are talking about. But even you and your brain need to keep updating as new information becomes available.. that’s what keeps us young remember?

Carla says:
August 18, 2013 at 5:47 pmBut even you and your brain need to keep updating as new information becomes available..
There is no new information that changes the fundamental picture that was laid down so long ago. What we have now are mere details and curlicues [which are, of course, interesting in their own right and so nicely confirmatory of the general picture]

lsvalgaard says:
August 18, 2013 at 5:55 pm
Carla says:
August 18, 2013 at 5:47 pm
But even you and your brain need to keep updating as new information becomes available..
There is no new information that changes the fundamental picture that was laid down so long ago. What we have now are mere details and curlicues [which are, of course, interesting in their own right and so nicely confirmatory of the general picture]
—
You mean more specific details from satellites. And I like the curly-cues, being just a stamp collector and all.. We have more data from satellites coming in, I think, than we have people to help cross ref over different but similar disciplines and disseminate it. Like for instance, I’m hoping the Wyman/Redfield team has seen the latest heliotail models from IBEX and ICECUBE.

HenryP says:
August 19, 2013 at 2:54 amHow often, exactly, do the poles of the sun change sides?
They change polarity once per solar cycle [near solar maximum].

Have you ever heard of a double flip over?
The ‘flip’ is a period where the polar fields go to zero and they can vary a bit around zero during that. but once established the polar fields are steady and well-behaved until the next solar maximum, so no ‘double flips’.

HenryP says:
August 19, 2013 at 4:53 amthere is an extraordinary amount of variation around same zero from 1966 -1972 compared to the three solar cycles after that (when the poles flip over) Do you perhaps know why?
Two reasons: 1) measurement noise was larger then, and 2) there were 2-3 large surges of magnetic flux so the polarity was, indeed, fluctuating. We can also see that in the cosmic ray record, e.g. http://143.160.38.244/webfm_send/42735 but I would call those ‘fluctuations’ rather than ‘double flips’.

Leif says
I would call those ‘fluctuations’ rather than ‘double flips’

henry says

I think that that is the solenoid. I suspect it will also start kicking in now, 2010-2016.
Namely, if there were not something to reverse the process we are in now, as per your graph,
where would we end? No magnetic field?

HenryP says:
August 19, 2013 at 5:19 amI think that that is the solenoid.
There is no ‘solenoid’.

Namely, if there were not something to reverse the process we are in now, as per your graph,http://www.leif.org/research/Solar-Polar-Fields-1966-now.png where would we end? No magnetic field?
The polar fields do go to zero during a reversal, but then come back with opposite polarity. The new polarity is already there at lower latitudes, on its way to the polar regions. So the polar fields the next three-four years will rebuild. From its value 3-4 years down the road we should be able to forecast how strong cycle 25 will be.

I am sure you don’t understand what I am getting at
I am saying: your graph
in general shows a continuous weakening of the magnetic field of the sun, in every successive cycle, since 1972, and if it were to continue like this,unabated,
there would be no field in 40 years from now?
So something has to “switch” to get the sun’s field strength marching in the opposite direction again?
What switch then do you propose? When?

HenryP says:
August 19, 2013 at 6:32 amin general shows a continuous weakening of the magnetic field of the sun, in every successive cycle, since 1972, and if it were to continue like this,unabated, there would be no field in 40 years from now?
Solar activity goes down, and goes up, and in general varies with time. Here you can see estimates of the polar fields back to 1910: http://www.leif.org/research/AMJ-100-Years-Polar-Fields.pdf

So something has to “switch” to get the sun’s field strength marching in the opposite direction again? What switch then do you propose? When?
The polar fields [and therefore the size of the next cycle] are formed by a rather random process: 5-7 ‘surges’ of magnetic flux reaching the poles [see link below], being only about 1/1000 of the total flux erupting on the Sun during a solar cycle. Suppose you were to flip a coin and count heads; after, say, three heads your argument would say that there must be something that has to switch in order for the next toss to show tails. Actually, nothing needs to ‘switch’ in a random process.

MiCro says:
August 19, 2013 at 7:24 amDo we have a reason the Sun’s poles switch every solar cycle? What happens in the Sun?
Yes we do: http://www.leif.org/research/ApJ88587.pdf “The solar polar fields reverse because magnetic flux from decaying sunspots moves towards the poles, with a preponderance of flux from the trailing spots”

The angular momentum theory if one goes back in past history has been very useful in showing when solar activity will be quiet and when it will be active.

The solar magnetic field is in a continuing weakening mode , and one can see by looking at the graph of the north /south polar fields (presented in this article) how much less pronounced the degree of maximum magnitude reached in the most recent past flip was, in comparisome to ALL of the earlier recent flips and can make a case that the current flip going on now may be even weaker.

The solar situation today is much different then it was from the end of the Dalton through 2005,and trying to extrapolate and use data from what the sun did (over the past recent several solar cycles prior to solar cycle 24) is a very foolish approach.

Solar cycle 24 is weaker then any of the forecast that were made by mainstream ,back in 2007 or so. In contrast those who heed the angular mometum theory were much more correct.

Salvatore Del Prete says:
August 19, 2013 at 10:28 amIn contrast those who heed the angular momentum theory were much more correct.
Actually not. Landscheidt failed regularly, and the AM ‘theory’ violates the laws of physics http://www.leif.org/EOS/Shirley-MNRAS.pdf. Of course, that matters little if you don’t know any physics…

Salvatore Del Prete says:
August 19, 2013 at 10:28 amhow much less pronounced the degree of maximum magnitude reached in the most recent past flip was
You do not know whereof you speak. At the ‘flip’ the magnitude of the solar polar field is always zero.

Carla says:
August 19, 2013 at 1:01 pmDr. S., are polar fields now hung up at the solar equator or the magnetic equator? If magnetic equator, is this part of the HCS waviness as the magnetic equator is wavy.
The polar fields are measured on the solar surface around the solar rotation axis [the poles of the Sun]. The Hale magnetic polarity laws are controlled by the rotational solar equator which is thus the magnetic equator on the surface. The ‘magnetic equator’ of the HCS is created in the upper corona and there determines the waviness. The two magnetic equators are distinct. You can project the magnetic equator in the corona down to the surface to see what structures give rise to the waviness, see e.g. Slide 11 of http://www.leif.org/research/On-Becoming-a-Scientist.pdf

lsvalgaard says:
August 19, 2013 at 1:21 pm
—
Thanks Dr. S., good explanation. And I did check out the “On Becoming a Scientist,” pdf a couple days ago. Antarctica and Greenland Dr. S. talk about having been to the ends of the Earth. lol
But..
I think you need to take a closer look at the way the ISMF angle couples with HCS magnetic equator. And you also may want to reconsider the possibility of an Interstellar type current sheet that changes sign also.

And this might give your hair a curly cue..
Taken from:
THREE-DIMENSIONAL FEATURES OF THE OUTER HELIOSPHERE DUE TO
COUPLING BETWEEN THE
INTERSTELLAR AND INTERPLANETARY MAGNETIC FIELDS. III.
THE EFFECTS OF SOLAR ROTATION AND ACTIVITY CYCLE

“””This plane is inclined at an angle of about 60◦ toward the ecliptic plane of the Sun,
as suggested in recent publications relating the local interstellar cloud properties to
the radio emission observed by Voyager 1.
It is assumed that the latitudinal extent of the boundary between the slow and fast SW
regions, as well as the angle between the Sun’s rotation and magnetic-dipole axes,
are periodic functions of time,

while the polarity of the interstellar magnetic field changes sign every 11 years at the solar
maximum.

The global variation of the SW–LISM interaction pattern, the excursions of the
termination shock and the heliopause, and parameter distributions in certain
directions are investigated. The analysis of the behavior of the wavy heliospheric current s
heet in the supersonic SW region shows the importance of neutral atoms on its dynamics.”””

Was this a typo.. But no, I re-read it in its context and thought, gee makes perfect sense to me.
the Very idea that the “Interstellar” Magnetic Field is changing sign .. every 11 years..
Then the asymmetry in the hemispheric sunspots of sunspot cycle would just be changes in the angle of the interstellar magnetic field as the sun orbits ..

Carla says:
August 19, 2013 at 7:35 pmwhile the polarity of the interstellar magnetic field changes sign every 11 years at the solar
maximum.
Typo or not, it is just wrong. Try to search for ‘polarity’ in the paper. There are 9 instances:
1: while the polarity of the interstellar magnetic ﬁeld changes sign every 11 years at the solar…
2: of opposite IMF polarity…
3: although the IMF polarity was changed to the opposite every 11 years…
4: the global IMF polarity pattern…
5: Variations in the IMF polarity should exist behind the shock…
6: the polarity of the Sun’s magnetic dipole has a 22 year period…
7: The changes in the IMF polarity pattern…
8: 22 year magnetic-dipole polarity cycle…
9: Polarity reversals related to the 22 year period are very distinct…
The last one is about how the SW extends a bit into the interstellar medium taking the polarity reversals with it.
Nowhere is there talk about an undisturbed interstellar medium changing sign every 11 years, just the HCS pushing itself a bit into the interstellar medium.

Carla says:
August 19, 2013 at 8:06 pmYou would prefer an undulating interstellar current sheet, raising and lowering the solar current sheet better?
No, and it doesn’t.

Why is that wrong, “interstellar magnetic field changing sign?”
Because it does not. What the paper describes is the solar wind changing sign and that change being pushed a bit into the interstellar medium. Take away the Sun and there is no change in the interstellar medium.

leif says
Suppose you were to flip a coin and count heads; after, say, three heads your argument would say that there must be something that has to switch in order for the next toss to show tails. Actually, nothing needs to ‘switch’ in a random process.

henry says
Random? What are are the chances of me throwing the dice 6 x and I get:
6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1

Namely, from 2010-2016 we will see the same as what can be seen 1966-1972:
the magnetic field will be hovering between 100 and -100, as it does now.
Solar cycle will only really start taking off in 2016, and in the end it will be the same strength of solar cycle 24
Only the cycles after that will become stronger again….In fact, successive cycles will mirror the previous 4 cycles, or two cycles, whatever (I think we should rather count 22 years for a single solar cycle)
So, from 2016-2027, it will be cold, very cold.
And it will be dry, at the higher latitudes, i.e. no weather, as is already becoming apparent from the decrease in tornado’s and storms
From 2021-2028 there will be severe droughts on the great plains.

More CO2 is not going to help us. You know that that is just a myth. 7 billion people depend on us, now here, you and me, to get it right now. Will you help me get this message out? I pray that you will.

WHAT MUST WE DO?

1) We urgently need to develop and encourage more agriculture at lower latitudes, like in Africa and/or South America. This is where we can expect to find warmth and more rain during a global cooling period.

2) We need to tell the farmers living at the higher latitudes (>40) who already suffered poor crops due to the cold and/ or due to the droughts that things are not going to get better there for the next few decades. It will only get worse as time goes by.

3) We also have to provide more protection against more precipitation at certain places of lower latitudes (FLOODS!),

HenryP says:
August 19, 2013 at 11:40 pmRandom? What are are the chances of me throwing the dice 6 x and I get: 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1
in that order…
It is exactly the same as getting any other combination, e.g. 5, 1, 6, 3, 2, 4
.

leif says
It (the chance) is exactly the same as getting any other combination, e.g. 5, 1, 6, 3, 2, 4

henry says
if that is the order that you specify, before you roll the dice, then, indeed, it is the same, namely
1 / 6tothepower6

As I said, a very small chance. Something happening like that in front of your eyes is very NOT likely to be random or from a random process.

Anyway, I found your micro tesla graph interesting, so what I did is print it and set out the solar cycle number against the maximum micro tesla measured during that cycle
I got:

21 – 356
22 – 300
23 – 264
24 – 180

Trending on this, a linear trend gave me a correlation of 97.4 % and we will hit no maximum field (i.e. zero) in the middle of solar cycle 27.
A binomial trend gave me a correlation coefficient of 0.986 and we will hit no maximum field at the end of solar cycle 26…..
I then fitted a polynomial on this of the third order and got 100% correlation (can you believe this? what are the chances of this happening to me a such a random take of data) and we will hit zero maximum field before the end of solar cycle 25.
If you take these fits forward in time they will go negative, but you and I know that that will not be possible.So, there has to be a switch. It must be an abrupt switch. And it will happen during solar cycle 25, which as I said before, will be very slow to start up. I am convinced the switch will occur just before solar cycle 25 takes off.

Do you still maintain your untenable position here now that there will be no switch?

HenryP says:
August 20, 2013 at 7:06 amif that is the order that you specify, before you roll the dice, then, indeed, it is the same, namely
1 / 6tothepower6
But since you look at the result after you have rolled [or the sun has] the chance is exactly ONE.

the maximum micro tesla measured during that cycle
Wrong way as there is noise and small random variations. You should measure the average value over, say, two years around the maximum values and plot that.

If you take these fits forward in time
Those fits have no predictive power [are just curve fitting]

I then fitted a polynomial on this of the third order and got 100% correlation (can you believe this?
A third order fit to four points will always give you 100% no matter what the points are, so, yes I can believe that.

So, there has to be a switch.
No, if you have tossed three heads in a row, no ‘switch’ is needed for the fourth toss to be tails.

HenryP, I can’t believe you proposed your 654321 roll as a significantly difficult role. This type of statistical chance question is now part of middle school problem solving. And the answer the students discover is exactly as Leif stated. You need to up your game.

From Wikipedia: “Ludic fallacy – the belief that the outcomes of non-regulated random occurrences can be encapsulated by a statistic; a failure to take into account unknown unknowns in determining the probability of events taking place.”

Henry makes sense in that he knows there is a solar /climate connection.

What he does not know,is how weak will solar activity be going forward and how long will it last. In addition will the weak solar activity along with the associated secondary effects be strong enough in degree of magnitude , and long enough in duration of time to bring the climate to at least a gradual temperature decline, or might it result in the climate being brought to some sort of a threshold which would result in an abrupt temp. decline and a different climate regime, perhaps Dalton like as an example.

The problem in making a definitive climate forecast are the unknowns, such as the degree of solar activity, the degree of random earthly climatic items , the degree solar activity may effect earthly climatic items, thresholds that may exist, the non linear aspect of the climate system, where the forcings take place, and the state of the climate at the start of these forcings.

This is why I am confident to say the general trend in temperature going forward is likely down, but how far down or the character of the fall (gradual/fast or jerky) is very very hard to predict if not impossible.

For an example , one very large explosive volcanic eruption at the right place could change the climate substancially even if all other items were equal.

In addtion there has been shown to be a correlation between geological activity and solar activity. Low solar activity being associated with more geological activity overall.

Henry, you are attempting to draw predictive power from sparse correlations and regressions. A ludic fallacy at its finest. You can theorize about the principles all you want, but the actual predictive power of your statistical analysis is speculative at best.

leif says
wrong way as there is noise and small random variations. You should measure the average value over, say, two years around the maximum values and plot that.
henry says
you are welcome to prove me wrong, but I am convinced it will still show that field strength is going down when measured against time. If the occurrence of descending field strength against time were from a random process we would see correlation coefficients of 0.4 to 0.6, in which case I would have spent more time on it, like you suggested (to see if somehow I can find a higher correlation). As it is, I don’t have the individual data. But all your extra analysis would give me is a more accurate prediction on when we will hit zero. BTW I admit you were right about 4 points being too small for a polynomial of the 3rd order. Nevertheless I think I can predict from it that we will hit zero field during cycle 25. In fact it will happen in 2016, exactly on the schedule, as predicted by me.

brian says
Henry, you are attempting to draw predictive power from sparse correlations and regressions. A ludic fallacy at its finest. You can theorize about the principles all you want, but the actual predictive power of your statistical analysis is speculative at best.
henry says
this graph herehttp://blogs.24.com/henryp/2012/10/02/best-sine-wave-fit-for-the-drop-in-global-maximum-temperatures/
is not based on “a few measurements”
e.g. for the longest period, from 1974, there were 658000 measurements, global, balanced by latitude and 70/30 @sea / inland
It shows that in 2016 the cooling rate will start decelerating. The special configuration of the planets also confirm the date of 2016. We are in the period of the switch 2009-2016.

My analysis of the maximum field strengths when set out against solar cycles merely confirmed what I already knew.

S del P says
What he does not know,is how weak will solar activity be going forward and how long will it last.
henry says
I know exactly. The means tables here:http://blogs.24.com/henryp/2013/02/21/henrys-pool-tables-on-global-warmingcooling/
show that earth’s energy reserves are now getting to be depleted. Therefore we will fall by as much as the maxima are falling now.
I estimate this is about -0.3K in the next 8 years and a further -0.2 or -0.3K from 2020 until 2038. By that time we will be back to where we were in 1950, more or less…

I don’t see a particular big problem coming up with that, except for the droughts on the great plains,2021-2028. We urgently need to develop and encourage more agriculture at lower latitudes, like in Africa and/or South America. This is where we can expect to find warmth and more rain during a global cooling period.
We need to warn the farmers living at the higher latitudes (>40) who already suffered poor crops due to the cold and/ or due to the droughts that things are not going to get better there for the next few decades. It will only get worse as time goes by. We also have to provide more protection against more precipitation at certain places of lower latitudes (FLOODS!),

BTW@anyone
does anyone here know or has a good theory as to why the sun’s magnetic activity is “slumping”?
It must be to do with the sun’s iron core, slowing down in its turning speed? What would cause its iron core’s turning speed to slow down? Any ideas?

leif says
The Sun does not have an iron core
henry says
Leif, thanks. I really know nothing about the sun, neither how nuclear fusion works, exactly.
First: how can there be a magnetic field generated if there is no turning iron core?

HenryP says:
August 21, 2013 at 11:43 amFirst: how can there be a magnetic field generated if there is no turning iron core?
Magnetism has nothing really to do with iron. What creates the magnetic fields of sunspots is a ‘dynamo’. A dynamo works by moving a conductor across a magnetic field inducing an electrical current which in turn has a magnetic field [as all currents have], so if you have already a magnetic field [e.g. debris from sunspots from an earlier cycle] and there is circulation of solar plasma [which is an electrical conductor], you have the ingredients for a dynamo, and that is then what the sun does. Changes in the circulation or in the mechanism that brings old, ‘dead’ spots into the Sun will show themselves as changes in the magnetic field of the next solar cycle. By watching how much magnetic ‘debris’ there is [it collects in the solar polar regions where we observe it] we can predict the size of the next solar cycle.

@leif
Earth’s field changes over time because it is generated by the motion of molten iron alloys in the Earth’s outer core (the geodynamo).
you say there is no iron core in the sun
that makes no sense to me
because : then what causes the polarity change (when S changes to N) on the sun?
(So sorry if I sound stupid: I really don’t know anything about this)

Henry PLEASE get a book on solar basics. There are plenty. Years ago I asked Leif for a list. Just go to Amazon and type in Solar or Sun under the books category and you will get a very nice list. The iron core thing won’t be in there. But there will be lots about the magnetic properties.

HenryP says:
August 21, 2013 at 1:02 pmEarth’s field changes over time because it is generated by the motion of molten iron alloys in the Earth’s outer core (the geodynamo).
That the core is iron is not important. What is important is that the core is fluid and a conductor. The layers in the Sun where the sunspots are generated are also fluid [actually a gas] and are also electrically conducting [being a plasma], so the solar dynamo works fine.

you say there is no iron core in the sun, that makes no sense to me
Just because it doesn’t make sense does not mean it is wrong. It means that there is an opportunity to learn something, a teaching moment if you will.

because : then what causes the polarity change (when S changes to N) on the sun?
A sunspot group consists of spots with both polarities, but with a crucial detail: some spots [the ones trailing in the sense of solar rotation] are at a slightly higher latitude than the other spots. When the group decays, the magnetic fields from both polarity spots start their march towards the pole [it takes about a year to get there]. One the way, the polarities mostly cancel out [by randomly meeting chucks of the other polarity]. But because fields from the trailing spots [let us say of N polarity] are already a little bit nearer the pole there is a greater chance that they will survive and get to the pole. If the pole had S polarity, that will now be canceled by the arriving N polarity until all the S polarity is gone [this happens about midway in the solar cycle – where we are now, hence the ‘polar field reversal’], but more N polarity will still arrive during the rest of the cycle, so now the pole ends up with N polarity. This is how the change from S to N takes place. The spots of the old cycle were generated from a S field, but since the new polar field is now N, the new spots in the next cycle will be of opposite polarity, and so on, hence the flip between polarities.

(So sorry if I sound stupid: I really don’t know anything about this)
there are no stupid questions. The stupidity that some people show comes when they refuse to learn from the answers.

Leif Svalgaard says:
August 21, 2013 at 9:02 pmThis is how the change from S to N takes place
It is important to note that the description I gave is of an observational fact which was discovered in the 1950s and has been observed ever since.

thanks, leif, and yes, pam, I looked in one of Philip Plait’s books that I have here.
I think I understand it somewhat better, although it seems nobody knows for sure exactly all that
what happens on the sun/
it seems it is the fusion process that creates ionized particles and these electrons coming free move in the gas, and as they move (up?) they generate magnetic fields.
so less magnetic field must mean less fusion taking place….
Plait mentions that the whole fusion process is a careful balance between gravity and energy generation, but I do not have much more on that.
This is where I got stuck. The sun spins on its axis in a month. Does the time of this spin vary?
Or is it always exactly the same? If it varies, by how much?

HenryP says:
August 22, 2013 at 7:34 amit seems it is the fusion process that creates ionized particles and these electrons coming free move in the gas, and as they move (up?) they generate magnetic fields. so less magnetic field must mean less fusion taking place….
No, the ionization is due to the high temperature which in turn is due to gravity [compress a gas – e.g. in a bicycle pump or a diesel engine – and it gets hot]. The Fusion in the core is what prevents the sun from getting even hotter [by counteracting gravity and preventing further contraction].

The immediate generation of magnetic fields depends on two things: 1) the initial field and 2) the speed of the circulation. Those two vary on the shorter time scale of months and years. The fusion varies on time scales of millions and billions of years and will eventually be important, but not on a scale that is of immediate interest.

The sun spins on its axis in a month. Does the time of this spin vary?
Or is it always exactly the same? If it varies, by how much?
The sun is a gas and its rotation as we can observe it is determined by movements of the gas. Winds in the solar atmosphere, if you will. And there are small variations of the rotation rate [just like of wind speed on Earth varies].

leif says
And there are small variations of the rotation rate [just like of wind speed on Earth varies].

henry says
it seems again now you are sure that that variation in rotation rate is random – just like before you were sure that the diminishing magnetic field of the sun was random….(are we agreed now it is not?)
You mean to say that nobody ever measured the rotation speed regularly and tried to correlate it with anything? Not even with the movements of the planets?

from the data I have, I can deduce that, from 2016, we will see a mirror image of the magnetic field strength of the previous solar cycle strengths, i.e. we will see a reverse, like
25=24
26=23
27=22
28=21

(I think I am also not the first person in the world who observed such a pattern,one should also be able to pick it up from SSN on previous time periods?)

What I am trying to figure out is what causes the switch, in terms of physics;
I am (also) pretty sure it is initiated by the movement of the planets.

HenryP says:
August 22, 2013 at 10:31 amit seems again now you are sure that that variation in rotation rate is random
Many people have studied the rotation rate, including myself [e.g. http://www.leif.org/research/ast10867.pdf ] and many ‘findings’ have been reported, but none of them compelling or convincing, so we know of no systematic variations. Perhaps with one exception: the more magnetic the sun is, the ‘stiffer’ it is, that is: the more uniform does it rotate.

just like before you were sure that the diminishing magnetic field of the sun was random…
Your questions were not stupid. The stupidity comes in when you do not learn anything from the answers…

What I am trying to figure out is what causes the switch
As I said, there is no ‘switch’ that anybody will agree on. Lots of people have weird ideas all over the map, but that is not omething we can build solid physics on.

The stupidity comes in when you do not learn anything from the answers…

henry says
if the answers do not fall in line with my data, there must be something wrong with it.
The data always has to be correct.
Most recently I have come to consider that SSN probably is not a good proxy for anything at all.
It might be a good proxy if we were able to evaluate the volume of each spot. As it is, we only know, that generally speaking, if there are more spots there is higher magnetic field strength/
but we do not really know what goes on inside…..we cannot measure that.

Your magnetic field strength data
is a much better proxy, but we do not have data before 1966?
There are few other questions that I have on this:
1) What happened to the blue and light blue observations after 2004?
2) In the future, you expect the red to crossover to the top, positive, right?
Contrary to your expectation, I think something strange will happen in 2016.
I think there will be a double flip. But how would we know for sure if there was or if there was not a double flip? How would we possibly know if there was a double flip occurring, or even more flips, whilst we are hovering around zero field strength, anyway?
hint: there seems to be some flipping around just before 1970.

HenryP says:
August 23, 2013 at 7:06 amif the answers do not fall in line with my data, there must be something wrong with it.
More likely just with your interpretation of your ‘data’. The answers were just a restatement of observational facts, thus ‘data’

but we do not really know what goes on inside…..we cannot measure that.
We actually can. Just like oil prospectors on the Earth can see the structure of the Earth at depth. The technique is called helioseismology. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helioseismology

What we do know is that the polar fields around 1953-1954 were very strong [successfully predicting the strongest cycle #19 of them all] and the fields in 1964-1965 were very weak [successfully predicting the weak cycle #20]. No ‘switches’ taking place here.

1) What happened to the blue and light blue observations after 2004?
I have simply not updated the data from Mount Wilson., as we have superior Wilcox data up to the present. The blue data was just to show that they agree with the red as justification for extending the data back before Wilcox started in 1976.

2) In the future, you expect the red to crossover to the top, positive, right?
It is already positive, it has already crossed over. The rightmost column in http://wso.stanford.edu/Polar.html is the smoothed polar field corresponding to my red curve. Note that it went from negative to positive in April, 2013. You can follow the data back [scrolling up] to previous flips [change of sign] in Feb. 2000, Jan 1990, and Jan. 1980.

How would we possibly know if there was a double flip occurring, or even more flips, whilst we are hovering around zero field strength, anyway?
Because we are observing what the field does and can see it evolve and becoming non-zero with time.

there seems to be some flipping around just before 1970.
The blue data is of poorer quality before 1982 [as you can see from the larger spread], but it is quite possible that the field will oscillate around zero for a year or two, before settling in to its final value [which will determine the strength of cycle 25]. In three or four years time we shall know what that value will be and can then make a firm prediction. Anything else [including your musings] is just hand waving [or worse] with no predictive power.

henry says
interesting indeed. The problem is that I want to know what happened 50-100 years ago. In line with what I was expecting (if you could follow it), if you look at SSN, you do find that solar cycle 20 was similar in strength to 21. Before that, things become murky, hence my reasoning that SSN is probably not a good proxy (or my theory is incorrect, which I doubt – at this time)

My internet is not too good here, let me post this, and I will argue your other comments made later

HenryP says:
August 23, 2013 at 10:55 am
leif saysbut you did not make cross triple (or more) checks
Nonsense, the data from several solar observatories verify each other. And as far a observations are concerned triple or more checks are usually not needed when the noise level is low enough. If I take a photograph of the Eiffel Tower, I don’t really need to take several, to triple check that the tower is really there.

In line with what I was expecting (if you could follow it), if you look at SSN, you do find that solar cycle 20 was similar in strength to 21.
It is hard to follow assertions that are false. Cycle 20 had a smoothed maximum sunspot number of only 111, compared to the much more active cycle 21 [max = 165].

I will argue your other comments made later
My comments about this are not to be argued, but to be learned from.

leif says
It is hard to follow assertions that are false. Cycle 20 had a smoothed maximum sunspot number of only 111, compared to the much more active cycle 21 [max = 165].
henry @leif
eish
I did not look good enough
sorry
never mind the ave SSN during a Schwabe cycle (11 yrs)
we should be looking at the full 22 year Hale Nicholson cycle, or,
better still, look at the average SSN over 2 HN cycles
and then try to see the mirror pattern that I am predicting from my data

If I get some time I will do that one day, but why did nobody do this before me?
The magnetic field strength data clearly show that we must investigate this.

Even so, as stated before, for reasons given, and admitted by you, I am not sure if SSN is a good proxy for anything at all….

leif says
Anything else [including your musings] is just hand waving [or worse] with no predictive…
My comments about this are not to be argued, but to be learned from
henry says
musings
have not heard that word for a long time
I am amused.
I thought WUWT is a place for scientists of differing educational background and experience to learn from each other, sort of like,
being pupil and teacher to each other.
Obviously you know it all.
But we shall meet again,
as and when it will become obvious that solar cycle 25 will be similar to cycle 24
as predicted by me.

HenryP says:
August 23, 2013 at 12:02 pmnever mind the ave SSN during a Schwabe cycle (11 yrs) we should be looking at the full 22 year Hale Nicholson cycle, or, better still, look at the average SSN over 2 HN cycles
Not really, as the two cycles are not strongly coupled. They operate pretty much independently with occasional, random events driving them: ttp://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2013arXiv1308.2827C

@leif
SSN is a red herring, it does not give me much.
It is you who seemed not to have learned anything.
Clearly the sun’s field strength charts are not from a random process.
Any mathematician can see that you can draw a half hyperbolic curve from left to right
(parabolic on the bottom), as a best fit for the data,
and it ends somewhere near zero on the bottom: in 2016
The logical conclusion is that from that date (i.e. the lowest/highest point on those binomials)
things will only slowly move up again,
in line with my own data, and the planets, and the ozone data, etc.
If you are so clever, how on earth do you not recognize this?

Any mathematician can see that you can draw a half hyperbolic curve from left to right
(parabolic on the bottom), as a best fit for the data
Curve fitting without physical understanding has no predictive power

in line with my own data, and the planets, and the ozone data, etc.
So, you suffer from confirmation bias.

If you are so clever, how on earth do you not recognize this?
Perhaps you are just wrong, and that is why you fail to impress.

@leif
it seems you do not know stats or donot trust it
1) you measure, big sample, if possible
2) you establish a trend versus time and correlation coefficient (“curve fitting”)
3) if r>0.95 you can be certain that correlation exists
4) you project backwards in time, and check that history confirms the trend, as far as we can,
ensuring having reliable records, that can be referred to.
(with weather do not expect 100% that history confirms the trend because of many factors, mostly due to inaccurate/inconsistent measurement the further you go back in time)
5) If there is reasonable evidence that history confirms the trend, you can the take the curve forwards in time….http://blogs.24.com/henryp/2012/10/02/best-sine-wave-fit-for-the-drop-in-global-maximum-temperatures/

Was or is there a specific reason as to why the sun’s magnetic field strength is measured only every ten days?

HenryP says:
August 24, 2013 at 6:16 am1) you measure, big sample, if possible, etc
Your problem is that you have done none of those things. For example, for the solar polar fields you only have four independent data points [one for each cycle]. And even if you did, it would still not be a valid prediction, unless you know the physics behind the data, and can explain the data in numerical detail.

Was or is there a specific reason as to why the sun’s magnetic field strength is measured only every ten days?
It is measured every day, but the Sun has a backside too, so we have to measure over a full rotation to cover the whole polar region. So the daily field measurements are averaged over 30 days and reported every ten days [to cut down the mass of slowly varying data].

leif says
Your problem is that you have done none of those things. For example, for the solar polar fields
you only have four independent data points [one for each cycle]. And even if you did, it would still not be a valid prediction, unless you know the physics behind the data, and can explain the data in numerical detail.

@leif
my eyes had already caught that there is a descending (top)/ascending (bottom) relationship based on many field strength data (as confirmed now by you) culminating in a bending point somewhere around 2016, or there about. (2016 is significant in terms of my data)
Remember, with r>0.95, the relationship(s) that I determined is/are valid within the time period of those 4 points, even if I do have only 4 points. You do understand that? In other words, you give me the solar cycle (of any of those 4 that I chose to observe) and I can estimate the maximum field strength observed, from the trend line with highest rsquared..
(In AAS/UV/Visible spectroscopy we usually only use 4 points of the absorption measured to evaluate concentration)
In stats, I do not have to know the physics behind the data, as long as I prove the relationship.

Remember, I am not the enemy. I merely try to warn people against the coming cold, which will be accompanied by droughts > [40] latitude
To me, it does not matter all that much (since I have moved to Africa) but for the NH I think it will not be a picknick when we return to 1920-1950 –
where we are now,
on my weather clock.

HenryP says:
August 24, 2013 at 9:13 ammy eyes had already caught that there is a descending (top)/ascending (bottom) relationship based on many field strength data (as confirmed now by you)
There are only four independent data points [or three degrees of freedom]. So, you do not have thousands of data points. This is a fundamental truth you have to learn.

Remember, with r>0.95, the relationship(s) that I determined is/are valid within the time period of those 4 points, even if I do have only 4 points.
If you had only two random data points r would be 1.00, but the significance would be zero. So, no, the relationship is not necessarily valid.

You do understand that?
You do not understand the difference between correlation and significance.

In other words, you give me the solar cycle (of any of those 4 that I chose to observe) and I can estimate the maximum field strength observed, from the trend line with highest rsquared..
That is just curve fitting to given data and has no predictive power. You cannot give me strength for cycles outside of the four. For example: what is the field strength for cycle 20? and for cycle 19? If you cannot give me those, then you cannot predict cycle 25 either.

(In AAS/UV/Visible spectroscopy we usually only use 4 points of the absorption measured to evaluate concentration)
And that is enough because we know that there is a strong, real physical relationship.

In stats, I do not have to know the physics behind the data, as long as I prove the relationship.
In stats you cannot prove a relationship, especially not with only four points.

Remember, I am not the enemy. I merely try to warn people against the coming cold, which will be accompanied by droughts > [40] latitude
Warnings based on pseudo-science and invalid conclusions are worse than no warnings and are thus to be unmasked for what they are.

leif says
There are only four independent data points [or three degrees of freedom]. So, you do not have thousands of data points. This is a fundamental truth you have to learn.
henry says
Clearly, perhaps you should study some stats.
If I can see or know that a great number of data follow a certain distribution (in this case: binomial, both from the top and from the bottom)
then I don’t have to analyse all those data to prove that relationship
The 4 points are enough (for me) to prove what is going to happen.
I don’t have to do more: it is not my job. It is just a hobby.
You, OTOH, if you say you are the expert on the sun, should take heed on what I am alluding to, analyse all that data, in the way that I suggest, to establish the exact correlation and coordinates of the binomials. In that way you will be able to predict how long the cooling period will last.
(my own data suggests it will be cooling until 2040 plus maybe an overlap of about 5 years )
Or must I do everything on my own?

HenryP says:
August 24, 2013 at 10:22 amThe 4 points are enough (for me) to prove what is going to happen.
If that is the case it should also be enough to ‘prove’ what happened in the past, so tell us what the four data points say about the size of cycles 20 and 19.

Or must I do everything on my own?
The lot of a pseudo-scientist is a lonely one.

The problem is if you take a sample of solar opinions the answers and reasons are going to be different depending on who you talk to.

There is no consensus and many have a different take.

For example Geoffry Sharp, Peirs Corbyn,David Archibald versus what Leif has to say.

My two cents is the sun is in the first prolonged solar minimum since the ending of the Dalton, therefore I would say trying to predict what the sun is going to do going forward based on so called NORMAL so;ar activity over the last century may not turn out to be as correct as some may think it will going forward.

When the sun previously has entered very prolonged quiet periods the technology was not there to see what was or was not going on with the sun at those time.

I think much will be learned and some surprises will be coming about if this prolonged solar minimum lives up to the expectations ,some have called for.

Salvatore Del Prete says:
August 24, 2013 at 10:36 amFor example Geoffry Sharp, Peirs Corbyn,David Archibald versus what Leif has to say.
To rattle your chain a bit: None of those three know what they are talking about.

HenryP says:
August 24, 2013 at 10:54 am“so tell us what the four data points say about the size of cycles 20 and 19.”
size, measured in or as what?
You had no problem saying that cycle 25 would be like cycle 24 [“as predicted by me”].
But you can chose anything solar you are most expert in [sunspot number, f10.7 flux, solar polar field at preceding minimum, sunspot area, TSI, cosmic rays, …].

I will put it this way, back around 2007 or 2008 many were calling for solar cycle 24 to be very active. I believe at that particular time the three persons I mentioned in my previous post correctly called that solar cycle 24 would be very weak.

Henry you and nobody else(I included) has the crystal ball as to exactly what the climate may or may not being doing going forward.

It is dangerous to make a detailed prediction.

There are to many unknowns, and thresholds lurking that can cause your forecast to be wrong in both timing,degree of magnitude, and duration of the temperature change and even possibly the direction of the change, although I do agree strongly with the direction being down ,despite my lack of uncertainties, i just mentioned.

Still I like the fact you are trying to say and put out something with confidence.

Salvatore Del Prete says:
August 24, 2013 at 11:32 amI will put it this way, back around 2007 or 2008 many were calling for solar cycle 24 to be very active. I believe at that particular time the three persons I mentioned in my previous post correctly called that solar cycle 24 would be very weak.
Perhaps you could back that up with a link for each? If you cannot, then it is time to stop claiming that you can.
Here is the correct prediction [made in October 2004]: http://www.leif.org/research/Cycle%2024%20Smallest%20100%20years.pdf

HenryP says:
August 24, 2013 at 11:32 amthat would be in terms of the field strength data, as supplied
as explained, that really is your problem now, not mine
It is you who claim that the four data points you have are enough to tell an expert in statistics [as you claim to be] what the relationship is so that you can forecast cycle 25. I simply ask you to apply that expertise and certainty to hindcast cycle 20 and 19. Shouldn’t be too hard for you, considering how strong your faith is in your ability.

I have seen enough here … it is all political? … pity
Well, perhaps we have seen enough of your expertise and triple checked data. So: put up or shut up, as they say.

leif says
Well, perhaps we have seen enough of your expertise and triple checked data. So: put up or shut up, as they say.
henry says
you are so kind and helpful to the people of the whole world!
As I said, I put the monkey on your shoulder now, you should just run with it now?
I don’t even want the honor. You can have it.
My data suggests that those two binomials (we are talking about the sun’s field strengths), if we were to take it backwards in time, must come to dead end stop somewhere in 1972 and then the 22/23 years before that time (1 solar cycle) must be similar / mirror the 22/23 years after that date (1972)http://blogs.24.com/henryp/2012/10/02/best-sine-wave-fit-for-the-drop-in-global-maximum-temperatures/

Salvatore Del Prete says:
August 24, 2013 at 12:06 pmthe above are predictions made by David Archibald about upcoming solar cycle 24 and 25 way way back in year 2006. What do you say to that Leif?
I would say that he was two years later than mine. Possibly even got his prediction from mine. E.g. he says in the first presentation you mentioned: “If Solar Cycle 24 is as weak as a number of solar physicists are predicting”. In fact, Archibald has made no prediction, just quoted ours.

HenryP says:
August 24, 2013 at 12:07 pmI don’t even want the honor. You can have it.
There is no honor in backing out. The fact is that one [and you] cannot make predictions based solely on curve fitting the four cycles of solar polar fields.

I cannot help you further.
Translation: you don’t know how to.

Salvatore Del Prete says:
August 24, 2013 at 12:08 pmIf you google solar predictions made by David Archibald you will see he made the correct prediction way back in year 2006.
I made the correct prediction way back in 2004, and Schatten [using same method] back in 2003.
Archibald cites Schatten. How about Corbyn’s prediction?

Salvatore Del Prete says:
August 24, 2013 at 12:06 pmthe above are predictions made by David Archibald about upcoming solar cycle 24 and 25 way way back in year 2006. What do you say to that Leif?
In the 2006 paper Archibald bases his work on our predictions, and he cites us as follows:
Schatten, K. H. and W. K.Tobiska 2003, Solar Activity Heading for a Maunder Minimum?,
Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, 35 (3), 6.03.
Svalgaard, L., E. W. Cliver and Y. Kamide 2005, Cycle 24: the smallest sunspot cycle in 100
years?, Geophysical Research Letters, 32, L011104.

who decides and on what basis when a new solar cycles begins and when it ends
this should (probably) be re-organized and ordered according to changes as observed (mainly) by the movements of the planets, even in retrospect.

HenryP says:
August 24, 2013 at 1:58 pmwho decides and on what basis when a new solar cycles begins and when it ends
The Sun does. A new cycle begins when the first sunspot group of opposite polarity appears at high latitudes [say 35 degrees] and ends when the last sunspot group of that polarity appears near the equator about 17 years later. Thus solar cycles overlap by several years, determined by the changes of the polarities of the magnetic field. This definition works even if no spots are visible, e.g. during a Grand Minimum.
The planets have nothing to do with this.

So, in the (projected) absence of visible sunspots and surface features, how will you (the sunspot community) decide on when the next four-five-six cycles:
Start?
Peak?
double-peak? (Assuming an “invisible” cycle could actually have other traits (like 10.7 flux ??) that might exhibit double-peaks? )
Begin – if the first “invisible” cycle is still going on?
Finally end?

RACookPE1978 says:
August 24, 2013 at 3:38 pmSo, in the (projected) absence of visible sunspots and surface features, how will you (the sunspot community) decide on when the next four-five-six cycles
today we can directly measure the magnetic fields of regions on the Sun, so no problems will arise as to when the cycles begin and end [this presumes that the Sun does not go completely wild and does something unexpected]. Another way is to measure the modulation of cosmic rays which follows the cycles, spots or no spots. We know that the cycle continued through the Maunder Minimum because we can see the modulation of cosmic rays preserved in ice cores.

leif says
The Sun does.
The planets have nothing to do with this.
henry says
well…I beg to differ. First of all, as discussed, “sunspot or sunspots or SSN” has/have no SI dimension, so your idea that the sun “does it ” is not very scientific, to say the least.
I found a clear and special relationship between the movement of some of the planets and the change in maximum temperatures on earth, which clearly must involve the cranking up or down of our sun; or otherwise, the atmosphere affected by the sun’s particular’s changing output. As you probably know, so did William Arnold. (1985, on the special theory of order). He found exactly the same as me now, namely mainly the planets Saturn and Uranus working together that seem to form a push and pull trigger.
But I guess that you have not come yet to this new (old) line of thinking.

Anyway, I will spend some time on this, if I get it, to see what I can find out about this; if you could please just direct me to some good data set with monthly/yearly SSN counts set out against time?

HenryP says:
August 25, 2013 at 1:35 amwell…I beg to differ. First of all, as discussed, “sunspot or sunspots or SSN” has/have no SI dimension, so your idea that the sun “does it ” is not very scientific, to say the least.
A count does not have a dimension, e.g. the town where I live has 55,000 inhabitants. What is the dimension?

But I guess that you have not come yet to this new (old) line of thinking.
Your guess is spot on.

Anyway, I will spend some time on this, if I get it, to see what I can find out about this; if you could please just direct me to some good data set with monthly/yearly SSN counts set out against time?http://sidc.be/sunspot-data/

goldminor says:
August 25, 2013 at 7:29 amI noticed that the ssn hit 161 several days ago and is now back down to 101. Is this number likely to be the peak for cycle 24?
On a daily basis the SSN can vary a lot, so we don’t look to the daily number to determine the peak. The standard method is to average over a year and compare with that. Even so, there are often several peaks, so the ‘peak’ should really be considered over a period which for a low cycle like cycle 24 can be several years long. With that definition we are in the peak period.

Mario Lento says:
August 25, 2013 at 11:37 amLeif: We are lucky to have you here, as you force us to think critically.
Isn’t that what WUWT is all about? Of course, some people don’t learn or think critically but luckily they give themselves away.

Leif: It is human nature to be offensive when our belief’s are challenged, but as humans we should strive to not take things as offensive. As I often say, we learn more from being wrong than being right… We can do so if we have patience, as you are teaching us. And Yes, that is what WUWT is all about. Anthony has done a stellar job of cultivating an open forum for scientific self enlightenment!

leif says
A count does not have a dimension, e.g. the town where I live has 55,000 inhabitants. What is the dimension?
henry says
yes we all know that
the problem is that circumference (and indeed spot count) might not matter that much, it is volume that counts. So, you people are measuring something like the leaves on a tree and think that that might be a good indication of how big the tree is. Obviously that is a stupid idea.
You might as well throw it all away.
e.g
I evaluated all counts going back to 1884
there is a general uptick of about 0.3 SSN ( for lack of a dimension) per annum from the 18 eighties with zero correlation.

In true Maunder like fashion I have witnessed the “earth killing sunspots” so to speak over the last year or two. They come into view, either mellow out, fully decay, or partially decay. Turn the limb and bam! return to life. Whats up with that? I can’t be the only one who has noticed this. Is this something that has been observed in the past? Any theories on what causes the sunspots to enter sleepmode while facing earth?